Fruit Yogurt Loaf
Fruit Yogurt Loaf is a moist loaf cake that uses a mixture of yogurt and coconut oil as a slightly tart replacement for butter. A fruit compote of your choice is mixed into the batter just before baking, and can also be used to decorate the top of the loaf. For this recipe, I used home-grown rosella (edible hibiscus) but you could equally use strawberries, persimmon, rhubarb, blueberries or any other preferred fruit.
To make the fruit compote in advance, use about 1 part sugar to two parts chopped fruit, cooking over medium heat in a saucepan until just softened, typically 10-15 minutes. For sweeter fruits like persimmons or apricots, you can use less sugar, while tart fruits like rhubarb will require a little more. In either case, you can let taste be your judge. You can also add spices such as cinnamon to the compote, or other ingredients such as shredded coconut or finely diced candied ginger. The recipe only uses 100 g compote, but if you make a larger batch, you can freeze away small portions for later use.
Ingredients
200 g full-cream unsweetened yogurt
200 g caster sugar
1 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla essence
80 g coconut oil
2 eggs
250 g plain flour
1 ½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
100 g fruit compote
Method
Pre-heat oven to 180 ºC (convection, not fan-forced). Beat together yogurt, caster sugar, salt and vanilla essence until sugar is dissolved. Gradually add coconut oil until well mixed. If coconut oil is solid at room temperature, microwave for a few seconds to liquefy. Beat in eggs one at a time. Sift flour, baking powder and baking soda into a bowl, then add gradually to wet mixture while beating well. Add fruit compote and stir in by hand until almost but not completely mixed, reserving 2-3 teaspoons of compote to decorate the top of the loaf. Fill batter into a greased, paper-lined loaf pan (21 x 11 cm base), then add reserved compote in a line along the centre of the loaf. Draw a skewer crosswise through the compote to make a zigzag decoration across the top of the cake. Bake 1 hour or until a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean. Allow to cool for 30 min before turning out.