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What a wonderful cake! My daughter couldn’t stop eating another slice. It came out just like your photo, and tastes like a fresh orange pound cake. I’m in love! ~ Lilly
My flourless tangerine cake is made without any flour or oil ~ yet it’s fluffy, moist, and fabulous!
This is one of those times you just have to take my word for it, and give this unique flourless tangerine cake a try. The minute you spot great tangerines, put this easy recipe on your to-do list, you won’t regret it.
This gluten free cake is made with whole tangerines, peel and all!
Cakes made with whole citrus fruits have always fascinated me. The concept comes from the sunny island of Sicily, where citrus trees grow like weeds. The fruit is boiled, de-seeded, and processed into a brilliant orange puree. The puree is blended with eggs, sugar, and almond flour, poured into a tart pan, and baked into the moistest, most delicate, tangerine cake you’ve ever tasted. This is an experience not to be missed.
what you’ll need for flourless tangerine cake
- fresh juicy tangerines
- the better your fruit, the tastier your cake will be.
- eggs
- white sugar
- almond meal or almond flour
- baking powder
- Amaretto, optional
- confectioner’s sugar for dusting
I use a high speed blender to make a tangerine puree
It’s hard to believe that the boiled tangerines, above, will magically morph into such a delightfully fluffy cake with so few ingredients and such minimal effort. It blows my mind every time. I used my Vitamix, which does an amazing job blitzing the tangerines into a silky puree, but any good food processor will work.
The right pan for this recipe
I bake my flourless tangerine cake in a 9-inch tart pan with a removable bottom so I can lift it out for serving and cutting. (You can also use a cheesecake pan.) The cake bakes up moist and dense, but with a light, almost sponge cake texture. I know it sounds strange, but it really is light and dense at the same time.
This tangerine cake is moist enough to make ahead
The cake slices like a dream, and will stay most for several days at room temperature. If you’d like to make it a day ahead, dust with powdered sugar just before serving.
decorating the cake with a lace effect
To get the pretty lace effect lay a doily or piece of lace on top of the cooled cake and then sift powdered sugar over all. Carefully life off the lace and voila! Don’t be afraid to try, you can always cover up with a solid layer of powered sugar if necessary.
See my post on How to Decorate a Cake with Lace for detailed instructions on how to achieve this pretty and surprisingly easy look. The technique is so versatile and can be used for all kinds of special occasion desserts from the winter holidays, to Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, Easter, etc.
Sometimes the message of a post can get drowned out by all the text and photos…so I’ll just put it here in plain black and white~
Try this, it’s sensational.
After making this cake in 2012 I went on to make a FLOURLESS WHOLE MEYER LEMON CAKE in 2013 which is wonderful, too. I’m already experimenting with pink grapefruit and blood oranges ~ I’ll keep you posted 😉
Tips for making flourless tangerine cake
- use good, sweet, seasonal tangerines…your cake will be as good as your fruit, so choose the best!
- Since you will be using the whole fruit, I recommend organic tangerines, if possible.
- Weigh the puree so that you get the proper amount in your cake. It should be 11 1/2 ounces.
- You can experiment with flavoring this cake. I added Amaretto on a whim, and you could use other spirits like Grand Marnier. You could also leave out the alcohol and use some vanilla or almond extract.
Flourless Tangerine Cake
Video
Equipment
- 9 inch spring form pan or tart pan with removeable bottom
Ingredients
- 1 pound tangerines to make 11 1/2 ounces of puree, approximately 5-6, but weigh them
- 3 eggs
- 1 cup white sugar
- 3 cups almond meal or almond flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 2 Tbsp Amaretto, optional
- confectioner’s sugar for dusting
Instructions
- Set oven to 350F Butter a 9 inch spring form pan
- Step one is the only time consuming part of this cake. Wash your tangerines and put them in a saucepan covered with cold water. (They’ll float, but don’t worry about that) Bring to a boil, and boil for a full 15 minutes. The boiling removes the bitterness in the citrus skin.
- Drain and let the tangerines cool for a bit. Slice them in half, and then in half again. Remove any seeds and discard, but do this on a plate so you don’t lose any juice or pulp. Put it all in a food processor and process until completely smooth. You may have to stop and scrape down the sides a few times. My finished puree weighed 11 1/2 oz, (about a cup) and I highly recommend weighing the puree and only using the 11 1/2 ounces. Too much puree will throw off the balance of ingredients in this cake.
- Set aside, or refrigerate until the next day if you want to do this ahead.
- The rest is a one bowl deal: Beat the eggs and sugar until light and creamy. Fold in the almond meal, orange pulp, baking powder, and Amaretto, if using. Mix until well combined.
- Pour into your prepared tart pan and smooth out evenly.
- Bake for 50-60 minutes, until lightly golden and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. If the cake is browning too fast, cover loosely with a sheet of foil.
- Cool on a rack for 10 minutes, then remove from the pan to finish cooling.
- Dust with confectioner’s sugar. Decorate with some citrus zest if you like.
Well, I tried to make this this morning and did not have a spring form tart pan. But I read that one of the reviewers used a bundt pan, so decided to try that. Big mistake, and probably because I was in a rush, I turned it over and it stuck in places, not in others, so I have no cake for my luncheon?. It will be good for my husband and I but not to take to a lunch party. Learned a good lesson.
Oh bummer! Definitely this cake would not work in a bundt, it’s way to delicate and moist. I hope you try it again Cathy!
I am so grateful for this recipe!! I cannot thank you enough! This is the perfect gift for the holidays for those who are gluten free!! I read and love your blog! Keep those amazing recipes coming:) God bless and happy holidays
Thank YOU Diann <3
I keep making this recipe because it is sooooo marvelous. I also make the pancakes.
I still haven’t tried the persimmon pulp, when I do I will let you know.
Have a wonderful Holiday Season.
Thanks Joan ~ I’m counting on you to try a persimmon version, it sounds so good!
Wow, looks awesome. Has anyone ever made with less than 1 cup sugar? Seems like with all that fruit it might work????
I haven’t tried that Marian, you might experiment with reducing it by about 1/3 first. Generally that shouldn’t change the results too much.
Can clementines be used instead of tangerines? That’s what I have on hand.
If they’re sweet and tasty they should work. Be sure to remove seeds.
Do we have to boil and peel Tangerine, what if i just juice it and strain it without boiling? Will the taste be maintained?
That’s an interesting idea, let me know if you try it. My only thought is that juicing whole tangerines will result in a thinner puree.
I made this cake but used lemons because my tree is heaving with them. It was delicious and such a great recipe. Will definitely make again.
I do have a separate recipe for lemons Rachael, which you might want to check out. I frosted it, as well, for an extra kick: Flourless Whole Meyer Lemon Cake.
This was dessert tonight. It was amazing.
I had to adapt it a bit as there were no tangerines at the grocery store, so I used organic mandarin oranges instead. Because they are so much smaller, there was a lot more peel, so it wasn’t too sweet (which in our house is considered a good thing). I actually peeled some of the oranges after boiling them so it wasn’t as bitter.
I also made a glaze with Greek yogurt (no creme frais in the fridge), icing sugar, a touch of grand marnier (which was also in the cake instead of amaretto) and some fresh squeezed orange juice (pretty sure it was another one of your recipes I used and had to adapt to what I had on hand).
Neither my son nor I are big cake fans (it’s that whole too sweet thing) and we both loved it, as did everyone else.
Thanks for another great recipe!
You’re so welcome Beth, and thanks for the full report on your changes, it’s so valuable to us all. I love mandarins, so I need to try this.
I served this cake at a game night. The taste was great but it was, as you said, rather dense. I’m going to try it again but this time I’m going to separate the eggs and using only the egg yolks for the batter, whip the egg whites and folding the batter in with the egg whites. It is a technique I use on a flourless chocolate torte that I read in Cooks Magazine. You should try it.
Let us know how that turns out Tere, the texture should definitely be lighter that way.
I made this with Meyer lemons. Added about 1.5x the recommended baking powder. And topped with a grapefruit glaze instead of powdered sugar. DIVINE! Thank you for the recipe, it is fantastic and so, so easy.
Grapefruit glaze on a whole lemon cake? That DOES sound divine!