If you are of Indian origin, I think you will feel the same way I feel about tutti frutti (it's candied peel for Americans). To me it brings back a lot of wonderful (sweet) memories of enjoying the summer vacation and special occasions with tutti frutti cake and ice cream.
One of my most favorite childhood eats was the milk cakes studded with these itsy bity pieces of tutti frutti. Long train journeys and short road trips where never complete without these cakes in our family. It was a tradition to buy a packet or two of these cakes while packing for the trip.
These cakes came in a lot of flavors, were soft, buttery and had a melt-in-your mouth texture. It tastes and feels more or less like a pound cake. Never did I think that I would be baking one of these tutti frutti cake myself.
I have been looking for these cakes in the Indian stores here for sometime now but couldn't find it. So I thought why not give it a try and bake an eggless tutti frutti cake at home. I searched for tutti frutti cake recipes in Google and it showed a lot of recipes from my fellow Indian bloggers.
After looking at a couple of recipes I decided to use this recipe as a base and mix in the tutti frutti and the result was stunning.
I already have an eggless pound cake recipe here, in which I have used silken tofu to replace the eggs and felt that the cake was quite dense.
I would have tried using part silken tofu and part yogurt like in this strawberry cream cake recipe which turned out perfect, but I didn't have silken tofu at home.
So I decided to use a combination of yogurt and homemade applesauce recipe. The tutti frutti cake did turn out well but I'm thinking that the silken tofu and yogurt combination will be more perfect. Can't wait to try that tutti frutti cake recipe one of these days.
Recipe
Tutti Frutti Cake
Ingredients
- 1 And ½ Cups Cake Flour
- 1 And ¼ Teaspoon Baking Powder
- ½ Teaspoon Baking Soda
- ¼ Teaspoon Salt
- ¾ Cup Sugar
- 13 Tablespoons Butter Softened (See Note 1)
- ¼ Cup Unsweetened Applesauce
- ½ Cup Plain Yogurt
- 3 Tablespoons Milk
- 1 And ½ Teaspoons Vanilla Extract
- ½ Cup Tutti Frutti (Candied Peel)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350F/180C for 15 minutes. Lightly butter a loaf pan (see My Note 2) and line it with parchment paper.
- Place the tutti frutti in a small bowl and mix in a tablespoon of flour (from the flour measured for the cake), separating the pieces sticking together. This prevents the fruit from sinking to the bottom of the cake.
- In a large bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, soda and salt. Whisk in the sugar.
- To this flour mixture add the butter and all the wet ingredients.
- Start blending the ingredients with an electric mixer at low speed and gradually increase the speed. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and continue beating the mixture for about 5-6 minutes. Now you can see that the mixture would have doubled because of the creaming of butter and sugar. Now mix in the tutti frutti pieces and combine it until its evenly distributed in the batter.
- Transfer the tutti fruiti cake batter to the prepared pan and smooth the batter out. Bake for about 55-65 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle of the cake comes out clean. Mine was done in about 58 minutes. The cake also started browning on the sides after about 30 minutes. So I covered the pan with an aluminum foil around the 33rd minute and completed the baking.
- Remove the pan from the oven and place it on a wire rack. Cool it for about 15 minutes and remove the cake from the pan and place it on the rack to cool completely. Leave it overnight before you can slice it. The more time you give it the easier it is to slice. I got very neat slices the following afternoon.
My Notes
- The original recipe mentioned ½ cup plus ⅓ cup of butter which is 13 tablespoons. The butter I get here does not have the tablespoon marking. So I used little more than ¾th cup (12 tablespoons) of butter.
- A 9x5 inch was used for this measurement in the original recipe and I felt that an 8x4 inch should be fine. So I used it and I didn't get the shape I expected. I was expecting a square cake slice but what I got was a perfect rectangle.
- I have replaced 3 eggs in the original recipe with ¼ cup of applesauce and ½ cup yogurt.
Taste & Texture
- I knew that this tutti frutti cake was a winner as soon as it came out of the oven. It had the perfect color, looked absolutely perfect, fantastic aroma and had a crumb-y outer layer. I coudln't wait to slice it and taste the cake. So I was hasty as always and started slicing the cake within an hour or so and what do you think would have happened? Of course I did not get neat slices, it was all crumbly. But guess what, the taste was lip-smacking delicious. It was totally worth slicing the cake. I couldn't resist and cut a few more slices for all of us to taste and it got thumbs-up from everybody. My mother-in-law felt that maybe I could have reduced the sugar a little bit. I also thought the same but after tasting it once again the next day, I concluded that it was just fine. If you are going to serve it with ice-cream or thinking of using it as a base for some other dessert then you should be cutting back on the sugar. Otherwise it should be fine as such.
- I saved the remaining half of the cake for taking pictures. So when I cut the cake the following day evening, I got perfect slices. It was so easy to cut. So bake the cake and forget it until the next day. This cake looked and tasted as good as the milk cakes I have tasted in India.
Nutrition
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Karuna says
Hi Madhuram , I tried the tutti fruity cake and it was very tasty. However, after taking out from the oven it sank a little. I baked it for 55 mins and I believed I should hv baked it longer. The cake itself is very very moist. I hv a function to attend and was planning to make double the amount. What size cake tin should I use and how long should I bake it for?
Also do you hv a recipe for vegan baked cheese cake?
Karuna Nair says
Hi Madhuram , I tried the tutti fruity cake and it was very tasty. However, after taking out from the oven it sank a little. I baked it for 55 mins and I believed I should hv baked it longer. The cake itself is very very moist. I hv a function to attend and was planning to make double the amount. What size cake tin should I use and how long should I bake it for?
Also do you hv a recipe for vegan baked cheese cake?
Madhuram says
Mixing the batter too much will also make the cake sink. If you want to double the amount bake it in a 13x9 inch pan. Sorry, I don't have a vegan cheesecake recipe yet.
Athi says
Hello Madhuram
Which frosting goes well for this tutti-frutti cake?
Planning to bake this cake for a birthday party
Thanks
Madhuram says
Mm..this is actually a plain cake. But if you want to frost, I think probably buttercream frosting.
Isabel says
I made this. Absolutely delicious!
Madhuram says
Thank you, Isabel.
Maddie says
Hi Madhuram.
Made this cake several times now with soaked mixed dried fruits ..its a winner, rather you are the winner!!
Tried the tofu version too but i prefer to keep the applesauce. I didn't add any sugar as i dried fruits are sweet enough.
Normally my husband doesn't like cakes but since i started baking with your recipes, he's now loving them.
Thanks again n again for your wonderful recipes Madhuram.
Madhuram says
You're very welcome Maddie. You made my day with your generous compliments. Thank you very much.
Maddie says
Hi Madhuram
This cake looks yummy and would like to make it but i only have Nuttelex butter spread (never found vegan butter stick here). So do you think oil would work instead in this recipe? And if yes, how much can i use? Thank you for your reply and thank you lots for sharing your beautiful recipes.
Madhuram says
You're welcome Maddie. I'm thinking about 1/2 cup of oil should work.
A. S says
Can I use mango puree instead of applesauce. If yes what is the quantity to be used??
Madhuram says
Hmm...it should work.
Jesy says
I saw the rating and gave it a try and the result was incredible.
Madhuram says
Thanks Jesy.
SM says
Hi Madhuram,
I wanted to let you know that i took some inspiration from this recipe of your and improvised a bit..I got amazing amazing result.
I used Pillsbury cake mix
replaced 1/2 cup oil with 1/4 cup oil and 1/2 cup applesauce
replaced 3 whole eggs with 1/2 cup plain yogurt..
The cake was spongy and crumbless...
Thank you!!!
Madhuram says
Wow! That's great to know SM. Happy baking!