Orange Cake (Greek Portokalopita)

This portokalopita recipe is an old-fashioned Greek dessert. The name actually means Greek orange pie (portokali means orange in Greek and pita means pie), but it’s really a dense cake instead. The traditional Greek orange cake batter is made with eggs, olive oil, sugar, Greek yogurt, baking powder, and orange zest. Can you already picture how dense those ingredients make the cake? One of the ingredients that set this orange cake recipe apart from the rest is that it calls for crumbled phyllo pastry (also known as filo pastry) to be added to the cake batter rather than using flour.

Orange Cake:
4 eggs
1 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1 cup white sugar
2 cups plain Greek yogurt, strained
2 oranges, freshly zested
3 tsp. baking powder
1 (1 lb) pkg phyllo sheets

Orange Syrup:
3 cups orange juice, freshly squeezed
2 cups Monk Fruit Sweetener with Erythritol (Granular)

Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C/160°C fan, Gas Mark 4) and brush a 9x13" baking pan with olive oil.

For the Cake:
Put the eggs, olive oil, and sugar in a large bowl. Beat the mixture well with an electric mixer until the ingredients are well combined. Add the yogurt, orange zest, and baking powder and beat to combine.

Crush the phyllo sheets with your hands. Add the crushed phyllo to the cake batter and stir it in with a spatula. Evenly spread the batter in the prepared pan.

Bake the cake for 45-55 minutes, until a knife inserted into the center comes out clean.

Make the Syrup:
While the cake is baking; in a medium saucepan, stir together the orange juice and sugar. Bring the mixture to a boil then simmer it over medium heat for 20 minutes, until it thickens to the consistency of maple syrup, stirring often. Let the syrup cool.

Assembly:
Slice the cake into 20 pieces and leave it to cool. When the cake and syrup are cool, pour all of the syrup on top of the cake; it will be absorbed.