Tahinopita

Submitted by White Rose Child

"This dense, cookie-like cake- traditionally made in Greece during Lent- is filled with nuts and raisins and the taste... nothing short of incredible. To a hardcore sesame lover like myself, that is! This recipe is from Jennifer of The Vegan Lunchbox- visit her site for MANY more wonderful recipes, but this is quite possibly the best!"

 

• Ready In: 1hr 5mins
• Ingredients: 11
• Yields: 1 cake
• Serves: 12

ingredients

• 2 1⁄4 cups whole wheat pastry flour or 2 1/4 cups unbleached white flour
• 3 1⁄4 teaspoons baking soda, sifted
• 1⁄2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 3⁄4 cup tahini
• 3⁄4 cup orange juice
• 1⁄2 cup sugar
• 1⁄2 - 3⁄4 cup raisins (I used half each Thompson and golden raisins)
• 1⁄3 cup walnuts, finely chopped (optional)

• Optional for the sugar syrup

• 1⁄2 cup sugar (optional)
• 1⁄3 cup water (optional)

directions

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F Oil an 8-by-8 inch square pan or a 9-inch round pan and dust thoroughly with flour.
2. Sift together the flour, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon.
3. Pour the tahini into a large mixing bowl and slowly drizzle in the orange juice while beating with an electric beater. Add the sugar and beat well for several minutes, until this mixture is smooth and lighter in color.
4. Add the dry ingredients and continue mixing with the beaters. The dough will be thick like cookie dough, so you'll have to stop and clean the beaters out when they get bogged down! Be patient, it IS worth it. :-D When it's well mixed, knead in the raisins and walnuts, if using- they ARE tasty!
5. Press the dough into the prepared pan, using a spatula or slightly moistened fingers to press the dough into place and smooth out the top.
6. Bake for 35 to 38 minutes, until light golden brown on top- be sure it's baked through, but careful not to let it dry out. Let the cake rest in the pan for several minutes, then remove from the pan and cool on a wire rack.
7. You have three options: eat the cake just like this (YUMMM), dust it lightly with powdered sugar, or, as Jennifer says, you can "be really Greek about it" and make a sugar syrup: Boil the sugar and water together in a small saucepan for about 10 minutes to form a slightly thick syrup. Drizzle the syrup liberally over the top of the cake and brush on the sides.
8. Whichever way you decide, cut this edible Greek glory into squares or wedges and enjoy!

Reviews

[Anastasia S.]

I live in Cyprus and it's a traditional food here. This recipe is not authentic at all. I am sure that this can taste good but you shouldn't call it

 

[Studentchef]

This was a really great recipe, and I have to admit I used a full cup of raisins for this. The instructions were clear and easy to follow, and found that the syrup was a nice addition. It may be a personal taste of mine, but I wasn't too keen on the combination of tahini with cinnamon and orange juice. I like tahini a certain way, and never tried it with the abovementioned ingredients. But it did turn out well, as well.

 

[magpie diner]

I soooo wanted to say I loved this WRC, because I sure love the idea of it! It didn't work out as well as I had hoped, partly due to me I'm sure. I warmed my tahini a bit before adding it in, so it wasn't as stiff as right out of the fridge, that helped with the mixing. I also used a stand mixer so I didn't have any issues dealing with the dough. Actually, putting it together was a breeze. I took it out of the oven when it was nice and golden on top, unfortunately it was still really doughy inside, so it had to go back in and took quite a while to pass the toothpick test. But it was really nice looking, just very crumbly, tricky to get out of the pan in one piece. (I think if I tried again I'd use a square baking dish). But none of that really matters, the one thing that really isn't working for me is the very noticable taste of baking soda. I'm wondering if that could be reduced and still rise OK. I will try this again!! Thanks for posting WRC, I learnt a lot from making this as well. Made during ZWT6 Zingo.

 

[Debbie R.]

This wasn't quite sweet enough for me, but considering I left out the raisins, that's really on me. I loved the taste of the tahini and the orange juice. Really nice. My tahini was on the thin side, so I didn't have quite the same problems as the other reviewer. How much OJ or flour you use may depend on the thickness of your tahini. They only got too thick to move at the end. I've got an old mixer anyway. I think this might be better with both the raisins and the syrup. A word of warning re syrups tho: I haven't had a lot of luck with them on zaar for some reason. I wouldn't attempt it unless you know your way around making syrups/candy already in order to avoid the other reviewer's problem. ZWT6.

 

[invictus]

I want to preface this review by saying this is something I am going to try to make again and that I learned quite a few valuable lessons with this recipe. This was my first attempt at vegan baking so the issues regarding taste and consistency may have to do with beginner's ignorance and expectation. I appreciate the directions that this was going to be a very thick batter. I had to stop several times to get the gunk off the beaters just as mentioned in the instructions. By the last addition of flour it was clear that this was going to be a very dense cookie but I didn't realize just how dense. I replaced the raisins with dates because that is what I had in the house. I also did decide to use the glaze but that was a mistake at least for me. While spreading the glaze on top of the cake the cake itself started crumbling and falling apart. The more I spread the more it fell apart and the glaze hardens very fast and I couldn't spread fast enough. What resulted was a crumbly mess half glazed and half not. The taste itself was somewhat drier than I anticipated. The tahini is very thick and sticks to the roof of your mouth and with only 3/4 cup liquid in the recipe I felt that it was a little dry and hard to swallow. But, again, I will be making this again perhaps adding more liquid and being more diligent with the glaze aspect or doing away with it.