This olive oil cake is mildly sweet, with a hint of orange zest and five-spice powder. If you don’t finish it the first day, slice it into cubes and top with whipped cream and orange slices, or spread honey on toast.
| Prep Time: | 15 mins |
| Cook Time: | 45 mins |
| Additional Time: | 10 mins |
| Total Time: | 1 hr 10 mins |
| Servings: | 10 |
| Yield: | 1 loaf cake |
Ingredients
- 4 eggs
- ¾ cup white sugar
- ⅔ cup extra-virgin olive oil
- 2 tablespoons fresh orange zest
- 1 teaspoon Chinese five-spice powder
- 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 1 pinch salt
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly oil and flour a loaf pan.
- Beat eggs in a bowl until lightened in color. Add sugar, olive oil, orange zest, and five-spice powder and beat until smooth. Fold flour, baking powder, and salt into egg mixture until batter is just mixed. Pour batter into the prepared loaf pan.
- Bake in the preheated oven until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 45 minutes. Cool in the pan for 10 minutes. Remove cake from the pan and cool on a wire rack.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 292 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 30 g |
| Cholesterol | 74 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 1 g |
| Protein | 5 g |
| Saturated Fat | 3 g |
| Sodium | 145 mg |
| Sugars | 15 g |
| Fat | 17 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
Love the flavor of this cake, but I think 45 mins in the oven is a tiny bit too long. Cake came out dry! Next time I might check on it at 38-40 mins.
This was great! Not too sweet with a nice orange flavor.
A nice simple recipe with delicious results. I can really taste the orange, cinnamon, and cloves in this bread. It’s a nice snack any time of the day and it freezes well. I also made a small batch of cream cheese with sugar and orange zest to top the bread. We sometimes eat it plain, sometimes with the warmed orange cream cheese icing.
its nice and easy to prepare
It came out really well, nice and moist. We added half the juice of an orange and cooked it for 40 minutes instead of 45, checking it at 30 minutes.
Good but not as great as I’d hoped. Seemed a bit bland. Used regular cinnamon so not sure how much difference that made. Will probably not make again.
Wow. I can’t believe how good this is. I think it’s my new favorite quick bread. Other reviews complained of it being dry. Mine was really moist. Perhaps they measured their flour wrong or cut into it too early. I let a quick bread like this, any bread really, sit at least two hours before cutting into it. It’s still cooking when you pull it out of the oven and it will loose a lot of moisture if you cut into it while it’s still warm. Followed the recipe exactly but added a little sprinkle of sugar over the loaf before I put it in the oven for a little extra sweet crunch on top.
Really good bread. Very easy to make. Luckily my neighbor gave me a tin of 5 Spice, because it’s pretty pricey. All other ingredients are inexpensive & on hand. It’s really great served warm with melted butter!! I’ll definitely make this again.
I’m going to withhold firm judgement on this until I make it again. I forgot to add salt to the recipe ( as listed in the ingredients) so my loaf was very flat and very dense (brick-like). Flavor was good, but not orangey enough for me. I used zest from 2 large oranges but maybe that wasn’t quite enough. Next time, I’ll use a third orange (or maybe a little lemon zest?). Regardless, I’m going to try again and will edit my review once I’ve actually made the recipe correctly!
It was a big hit in our group! Will definitely make it again.
Followed the recipe exactly. Good taste but too dry.
I’m a fan. The cake turned out well, on the first try. Because I did not have 5 spice at home, I used ginger & I added some finely chopped rosemary to the batter as well. For added decadence, I made an orange glaze over top.
Delicious!
I followed this recipe as written above and mine turned out dry. The flavor is great but why with all of the oil is it dry?
Great recipe, though I prefer it with less sugar and more spices.
It was great. Pretty much followed the directions as written. Even though I used half volume of very good quality olive oil (and the remainder was 365 organic evoo), I didn’t think the olive oil had too much presence. I used the zest from 3 plain navel oranges and added the juice from one. I put it in a tube pan and shortened baked for 30 mins (until insert came out clean). I think 40 mins would have been overbaked. I’ll absolutely make this again. It’s a great recipe.
Perfect with custard.
I really love this unusual and deliciously flavored bread. I’ve made it twice now and it’s one of my favorite quickbreads.
I substituted the Orange zest for Lemon extract.
I have not made this yet, but I am going to make it soon. Dolly in answer to your question. Chinese Five Spice is a combination of ground cinnamon, ground cloves, star anise, fennel seed, and szechuan pepper. If you can find Chinese cinnamon you can use that otherwise ground cinnamon is fine. This recipe looks wonderful. I will post again once I make it.
This sounds wonderful. I haven t made it, though. Can someone tell me what the Chinese 5 spice thing is. I have so many allergies I could never use a mix like that. Is it like cinnamon?