Genoa cake facts for kids
Genoa cake (supermarket own-brand with few cherries)
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| Type | Fruit cake | ||||||
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| Place of origin | Italy | ||||||
| Region or state | Genoa | ||||||
| Main ingredients | Sultanas/raisins or currants, glacé cherries, flour, eggs, butter, sugar | ||||||
| 340 kcal (1424 kJ) | |||||||
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Genoa cake (or simply genoa) is a fruit cake consisting of sultanas (golden-colored raisins), currants or raisins, glacé cherries, almonds, and candied orange peel or essence, cooked in a batter of flour, eggs, butter and sugar.
Origins
Although the name Genoa cake is mainly used in the UK, where recipes for it have been around since the 19th century, it is a variant of the pandolce (Italian: [panˈdoltʃe]; Ligurian: pandoçe [paŋˈduːse]; lit. sweet bread) cake which originated in 16th-century Genoa as a Christmas cake. Unlike Genoa cake, traditional pandolce includes pine nuts as a major ingredient and uses yeast as its raising agent, which requires several hours to rise, like bread. This original form is now known as pandolce alto ('deep pandolce'), whilst a simpler variant which uses baking powder is known as pandolce basso ('flat pandolce') and is essentially the same as the Genoa cake sold in the UK, with a moist but crumbly texture.
The term Genoa cake is also sometimes used to refer to two other Genoa-related cakes, neither of which are fruit cakes: génoise cake, a light sponge cake, and pain de Gênes ('Genoa bread'), a dense almond cake.
See also
In Spanish: Pandolce para niños
