Autumnal fruit and almond cake

You can use fresh or thawed frozen blackberries (or raspberries) for the autumnal cake; they may sink a little, but don’t worry too much as it is all about the taste. Dust the cake with a little icing sugar to serve, if desired. The success of this cake depends on the butter being nice and soft; leave it out of the fridge for about 6-8 hours for it to soften naturally.

 185g butter, softened at room temperature
150g caster sugar
150g (1 heaped cup) self raising flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
100g ground almonds
2 free range eggs, beaten
2 tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
250g fresh blackberries
2 tbsp raw or demerera sugar
2 tbsp flaked almonds
Preheat the oven to 180C (fan forced 160C). Grease and line the base of a 20cm springform or loose bottom cake tin.

Dice the butter and place the butter, caster sugar, flour, baking powder, almonds, eggs milk and vanilla into a bowl and beat with an electric mixer for 3-4 minutes, or until just combined. Fold in the 3/4 of the fruit.

Spoon into tin. Scatter with the remaining fruit, the raw sugar and the almonds. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes, or until firm and a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean. Leave to cook in the tin for 10 minutes, before cooling on a wire rack. Serves 8-10