Black Raspberry and Cornmeal Cake

an Indigenous Eastern Woodlands tradition rendered as a tender cake: stone-ground cornmeal and maple sweeten a golden crumb studded with the deep, wine-dark fruit of the wild blackcap raspberry, the berry that the woodland nations dried and pounded into their cornbreads for winter

Origin: The Eastern Woodlands of North America (Haudenosaunee and Lenape homelands)

From the journey of Raspberry.

For thousands of years before any European reached the eastern seaboard of North America, the Indigenous nations of the woodlands, amongst them the Haudenosaunee, the Lenape, and the Ojibwe, gathered the wild black raspberry (Rubus occidentalis, the blackcap) as one of the treasured wild foods of high summer. Unlike the fragile red raspberry, the black raspberry keeps its deep colour and concentrated flavour when dried, and the woodland kitchen made the most of this: the berries were sun-dried and pounded into the cornmeal breads and puddings that were the daily bread of a maize-growing people, and worked, with dried meat and fat, into the travelling ration of pemmican. This cake is a modern kitchen's homage to that pairing of the continent's own grain and its own berry. It sets the two ancestral ingredients of the Eastern Woodlands together: stone-ground cornmeal, which gives the crumb its golden colour and gentle grain, and black raspberries, whose dark, tart juice bleeds through the batter. Sweetened with maple syrup, the other great gift of the northern woodland, rather than with cane sugar, it keeps faith with the flavours of the region from which both the grain and the fruit came.

Ingredients

Cake

150 g fine stone-ground cornmeal (yellow)
150 g plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
0.5 tsp fine salt
2 eggs
150 ml pure maple syrup
120 ml buttermilk
90 g unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1 tsp vanilla extract
250 g black raspberries (or red raspberries), fresh or frozen
1 tbsp plain flour, for tossing the berries

To Finish

2 tbsp maple syrup, to glaze

Method

Preheat the oven to 180°C (160°C fan) and line the base of a 23 cm round or square cake tin with baking paper, then butter the sides. In a large bowl, whisk together the cornmeal, flour, baking powder, and salt.
In a second bowl, whisk the eggs with the maple syrup, buttermilk, melted butter, and vanilla until smooth. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and fold together with a spatula until just combined; do not beat.
Toss the black raspberries with the tablespoon of flour to coat them lightly, then fold about three-quarters of them gently through the batter. Scrape into the prepared tin, level the top, and scatter the remaining berries over the surface.
Bake for 35–40 minutes, until the cake is golden, springs back when pressed lightly in the centre, and a skewer comes out clean of batter (though it may be stained purple by the fruit).
Brush the warm cake with the two tablespoons of maple syrup and leave to cool in the tin for 15 minutes before turning out. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Notes

Black raspberries (blackcaps) have a drier, more intense, faintly winey flavour and a deeper colour than red raspberries; if you cannot find them, red raspberries or a mixture of red raspberries and blackberries work well, though the colour will be less dramatic. Sweetening with maple syrup rather than cane sugar keeps the cake within the flavour world of the Eastern Woodlands, where maple was the principal sweetener; a mild honey may be substituted. The cake keeps for two days in an airtight tin and is very good toasted and buttered on the second day.

The Gastrographer

Name: Black Raspberry and Cornmeal Cake
Prep time: 20 min
Cook time: 40 min
Total time: 1 h
Yield: 8
Cuisine: The Eastern Woodlands of North America
Ingredients: 150 g fine stone-ground cornmeal (yellow); 150 g plain flour; 2 tsp baking powder; 0.5 tsp fine salt; 2 eggs; 150 ml pure maple syrup; 120 ml buttermilk; 90 g unsalted butter, melted and cooled; 1 tsp vanilla extract; 250 g black raspberries (or red raspberries), fresh or frozen; 1 tbsp plain flour, for tossing the berries; 2 tbsp maple syrup, to glaze

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Ingredient originTrade or transit route

Became a culinary stapleColonial / trade control