How Much Orange Juice Do I Need For The Chocolate Fruit Cake?

Our answer

Nigella's Chocolate Fruit Cake (from FEAST) is a moist fruit cake that is a popular alternative to a traditional rich fruit cake. The cake batter is slightly runnier than a traditional fruit cake batter (which tends to be on the stiff side) and the recipe notes this when it says to "Pour the fruit cake mixture into the prepared tin". But this is one of the reasons why the cake is so moist and doesn't need "feeding" or maturing.

Usually an average orange has around 80ml (⅓ cup) juice and larger ones yield 100ml (7 tablespoons). So 3 oranges should give around 250-300ml (1 to 1¼ cups) of orange juice. So the oranges must have been very large and this is not a problem that we have encountered before. However, we suspect that the cake will just take a little longer to bake through if there is a bit more liquid in the batter. Bake the cake until it is firm on top and a cake tester inserted into the centre comes out with gooey crumbs on it (but not raw batter).