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Orange Blossom Semolina Cake or Basbousa is a a delicious coarse-textured semolina cake soaked in a rose water and orange blossom water simple syrup!
Sticky, syrupy and so good.
My homemade Basbousa or a fine semolina cake that’s loaded with tangy yogurt, butter and shredded coconut is such a delicious dessert.
The cake starts as any batter would, but we swap the all purpose flour for semolina instead. Then you let it sit at room temperature to allow the leavening agents to react with the yogurt and other wet ingredients. Pop it into a cake pan brushed with tahini paste so that it cups up all that flavor. Score the cake as rectangles or as a diamond and then add an almond to the center of each piece. When the golden brown, hot basbousa comes out from the oven, we’ll douse it in homemade sugar syrup that’s flavored with rose water and orange blossom.
It’s my absolute favorite dessert to make in the spring time when I want something a little different than baklava but with simple flavor notes!
Did You Know?
Semolina cake is a dessert made all around the world. In Turkey and Greece it’s called Revani, and it’s typically a lemon semolina cake with a lemon simply syrup soak, in Egypt it’s Basbousa, and it’s typically flavored with rose water or orange blossom.
Ingredients for homemade semolina cake
- Granulated Sugar: granulated sugar works best for this recipe. We’ll use some for the hot syrup and the rest gets added to the cake batter.
- Lemon Juice: is the acid in the recipe. It adds a delicious tang to the simple syrup
- Cardamom Pods: these are added to flavor. I grew up eating desserts with both cardamom and rose water, so though it isn’t necessarily authentic to an Egyptian semolina cake, it adds the best taste.
- Rose Water: adds a bright fresh floral note.
- Orange Blossom Water: adds flavor tot eh simply syrup mixture
- Semolina Flour: I use fine semolina flour for this recipe, or semolina flour.
- Plain Yogurt: I use plain yoghurt for this dish, but greek yogurt would work too.
- Butter: Melt the salted or unsalted butter and allow it to cool ahead of adding it to the cake batter. You can also swap this with melted ghee if you prefer. Authentic Basbousa from Egypt would typically contain ghee, not butter, like most middle eastern desserts.
- Oil: I used avocado oil, but canola or any other will also work.
- Desiccated Coconut: this is shredded unsweetened coconut powder. This adds a wonderful nutty flavor and texture to the semolina cake.
- Baking Powder: is the leavening agent
- Tahini Paste: we’ll use this to grease the pan before baking the semolina cake instead of cooking spray
- Almonds: this is to decorate the top of the cake with an almond on each of the slices.
Why you’ll love this family favorite recipe!
- It doesn’t require a stand mixer. Skip the fuss, all you need is a bowl to mix and a sauce pan to make the simple syrup.
- It’s different than your typical cakes. So it’s ideal to serve for Mother’s Day, persian new year, or in Ramadan amongst so many other events.
- It doesn’t need frosting. The hot syrup does all the heavy lifting here so you simply allow it to soak up all that goodness and then you’re ready to serve.
- It keeps for a while. Just pop leftovers into an airtight container and refrigerate. I like eating semolina cake straight from the fridge, but you could also bring it back to room temperature and then enjoy it.
If you like this recipe, you might also like:
- Lemon Olive Oil Pound Cake
- How to make Baklava
- Mascarpone Stuffed Dates
- Mabrousheh (apricot crumble bars)
Orange Blossom Semolina Cake (Basbousa)
Ingredients
Orange Blossom Syrup:
- 1 ½ cups water
- 1 ¾ cups granulated sugar
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- 1-2 cardamom pods
- 2 tablespoons rose water not rose extract
- 1 tablespoon orange blossom water not extract
Semolina Cake:
- 1 ⅔ cups semolina flour sometimes called coarse farina
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- 1 cup plain yogurt
- 3 tablespoons oil I use avocado
- ½ cup melted butter cooled to room temperature
- ¼ cup desiccated coconut very fine, not sweetened
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 1 tablespoon tahini paste to grease baking dish, cooking spray works too
- 12-20 blanched almonds depending on how many pieces you're making
Instructions
- MIX: Add sugar, water, lemon juice, and smashed cardamom pods (or ground if using) to a medium or small saucepan over medium heat and bring to a boil.
- SIMMER: When boiling, lower the heat to medium-low so that it gently simmers and the sugar dissolves. Let simmer for 12 minutes. Remove from heat, and add orange blossom and rose water.
- COMBINE: In a medium bowl mix together the dry ingredients: semolina flour, granulated sugar, yogurt, melted butter, oil, desiccated coconut, and baking powder. Add 3 tablespoons of prepared simple syrup.
- REST: Stir, then let sit for 30 minutes.
- PREP: Position a rack in the center of the oven and preheat the oven to 350ºF. Grease a 10½ x 7½ (a 9-inch square pan works too or something similar) baking dish with the tahini paste using a pastry brush.
- DECORATE: spread the cake batter into the prepared pan and spread to make an even layer. Score the mixture using a sharp knife to make 18-20 equal pieces. Place a blanched almond in the center of each piece.
- BAKE: the semolina cake for 30-35 minutes (for larger pans, it will take less time, smaller pans take closer to 35 minutes, while large pans will take 28-30 minutes. Insert a toothpick to make sure the texture is crumbly and cooked. Then place the cake close to the top and broil for 1-2 minutes keeping a close eye on the cake so that it turns golden brown without burning. Remove the cake from oven.
- SWEETEN: Drizzle the prepared syrup over the cake while it’s still warm. Le the cake cool for a minimum of 1 hour, ideally 2 hours before attempting to remove it from the pan. Doing so prematurely will cause the cake pieces to crumble. It's best to let it soak up all that syrup before removing. Enjoy!
Notes
- To blanch the almonds: add raw almonds to a small bowl, pour over 1 cup of hot water (175-200ºF). Allow the almonds to come to a sit for 5-7 minutes. Then strain the almonds. When the skin is loose, gently rub and remove with your fingers. I soak the almonds, but don’t remove the skins because I like the color variation!
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Like This? Leave a comment & rating below!
Looks very good and would love to try it. Question – do you drizzle the extra syrup on the baked cake, serve it on the side, or something else? I didn’t understand the fork-and-dippng test step in the instructions
Very easy to make and tastes better than the ones I buy from my local Halal store. A+
My first attempt, and successful. Everyone enjoyed it, even got asked for the recipe. Thank you Marzia!
I’m so glad to hear it was a hit for you!! ❤️
I recall making this recipe some time ago and it was amazing! I have just come back to it and I see the ingredients list is missing. Is there a way to see the ingredient list?
It’s back up, Sarah! We have made some changes behind the scenes so some of the recipes are still needing to be moved over to the new format!
Thank you! Thank you! I absolutely love this recipe! I’m going to make it today!
So happy to hear that, Sarah!