I love some of the gorgeous, vibrant winter fruits, especially the vivid pomegranates and cranberries! They add so much beautiful color and flavor to dishes during a time of year when everything else is drab and dull.
As a matter of fact, every social event I’ve attended this winter thus far, I’ve brought a cranberry-based dessert with me. I just can’t help myself! Whenever I start thinking about potential desserts to bring, cranberries just get stuck in my head and I can’t get them out!
This dessert was the result of one such situation. I knew I wanted a cranberry-based dessert, so I did a little googling to come up with ideas, and found this great recipe at Simply Recipes. I tweaked it, made it a little more whole-foods-friendly… and adapted it to use some freshly ground spelt from my WonderMill!
I used the pastry setting when grinding the flour for this recipe, and I think that helped contribute to a lighter texture than what you usually find when baking with whole grains. 
- ½ cup raw cane sugar (or coconut/palm sugar, or brown sugar)
- ¼ cup butter
- 12 oz fresh or frozen cranberries
- 2 cups freshly ground spelt pastry flour
- 2 tsp. baking powder
- ½ tsp. salt
- ½ tsp. ground cardamom
- ½ tsp. ground cinnamon
- ½ cup butter
- ½ cup raw sugar (or coconut/palm sugar, or white sugar)
- ½ tsp. liquid stevia (or another ½ cup sugar)
- 3 large eggs
- 1" piece of ginger, grated
- 1 TBSP. orange zest
- ½ cup plain yogurt
- ¼ cup milk
- In a 10" cast-iron pan over medium high heat, melt the butter and sugar together, stirring just until the butter melts completely. Once the butter is melted, stop stirring and let the mixture simmer for 15-20 seconds. Remove from the heat and pour in the cranberries; set aside.
- Preheat the oven to 350F.
- Whisk together the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, salt, cardamom, cinnamon) in a medium bowl; set aside.
- Beat the butter with an electric mixer until it is light and fluffy. Add in the sugar and beat until it is well blended. Beat in the eggs one at a time; then add the ginger and orange zest.
- Using the mixer on a low speed, slowly add about a third of the flour, followed by half of the yogurt. Repeat with another third of flour and the remaining half of yogurt. Follow up with the last third of flour and the quarter cup of milk. Stir just until mixed.
- Pour the batter over the cranberries, and spread until it is smooth. Place the pan in the preheated oven, and immediately turn the heat down to 325F. Bake for 55 min to an hour, or until the top is golden brown and a toothpick inserted comes out clean.
- Remove from oven and allow to cool for about 10 minutes. Loosen the edges of the cake from the pan using a table knife, then overturn onto a serving platter.
Note: I like to replace half the sugar in my recipes with stevia to cut down on my sugar consumption. If you prefer, you can just use 1 whole cup of your preferred kind of sugar.
Another note: if you don’t have a cast iron pan and/or don’t want to use it, then melt the butter and sugar in a sauce pan, and bake the cake in a regular round cake pan.
