blackberry and coconut olive oil cake

The reality of a Monday morning seems decidedly unreal today. 

It's been a weekend of such euphoric highs, from the ludicrously brilliant opening ceremony for London 2012 to a Saturday spent with my best friend, the bride to be, and the rest of the bridal party to the first GB medals yesterday and a Sunday evening spent at my first Olympic event. The only low was being removed from my position as chief bridesmaid for saying that I didn't think R-Patz was particularly attractive. 

And now I'm back to work and somehow have to concentrate on conference calls and spreadsheets.

I have put a lot of pressure on this summer. In the dark days of January and February, it was the thought that carried me through. 

I was worried, truthfully, that I had put too much pressure on summer, only to find that it had slipped from my grasp. 

I though that this raspberry and almond cake, back in June, would be the cake I would remember. It's a sprightly cake, bursting with flavour and fruit. Whilst I've eaten well since that cake, nothing has really lived up to it. There it was, I thought, there was the flatting taste of my summer. 

I bought some blackberries the other day; they are really rather wondrous aren't they? A real childhood fruit full of memories of summer days, scrambling around in blackberry bushes with scratched legs and fingers stained with juice. The combination of blackberry and coconut makes for a memorable pairing. It's hardly tropical - the coconut is too subtle for that - but it is light and fresh and really rather remarkable. 

As soon as I tasted a slice of this cake, I realised that summer has only really just begun. 

~

Blackberry and coconut cake

Adapted from delicious magazine via my raspberry and olive oil cake

Yield: A 23cm round cake (serves 8-10)

Ingredients

• 4 medium eggs
• 110g (1/2 cup) unrefined caster/granulated sugar
• 45ml (3 tablespoons) extra virgin olive oil
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract
• 85g (3/4 cup) whole wheat flour
• 50g (1/2 cup) dessicated coconut (unsweetened)
• 200g (8 oz) blackberries
• Powdered sugar to serve

Cooking Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 160C/325F and well grease a 23cm tin with butter.
2. In a large bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer, whisk together the eggs and sugar until the mixture is light and fluffy and has tripled in size (at least 5 minutes, probably closer to 10).
3. Pour in the olive oil and vanilla and continue to whisk until it has been incorporated.
4. Fold the flour and coconut into the mixture with a metal spoon, trying not to lose any of the air.
5. Finally fold in the blackberries.
6. Pour into the tin and bake for 35-40 minutes until the cake is golden brown and starting to shrink from the edges of the tin. Leave to cool in the tin for 10 minutes before transferring to a wire rack.
7. To serve, dust with icing sugar.