Madeira Cake
A weeknight-friendly British dessert built around butter, caster sugar and eggs — roughly 60 minutes start to finish, and rated medium to make. Scroll down for the ingredient checklist, a serving scaler and unit converter, and the method broken into 7 steps.
You'll mainly reach for oven. At medium difficulty across 7 steps, it's manageable with a little attention. As written, it's meat-free.
What you'll need
Shopping list (1)
Pantry staples (you likely have these)
🔁 Unit converter
How to make it
- Pre-heat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4. Grease an 18cm/7in round cake tin, line the base with greaseproof paper and grease the paper.
- Cream the butter and sugar together in a bowl until pale and fluffy.
- Beat in the eggs, one at a time, beating the mixture well between each one and adding a tablespoon of the flour with the last egg to prevent the mixture curdling.
- Sift the flour and gently fold in, with enough milk to give a mixture that falls slowly from the spoon. Fold in the lemon zest.
- Spoon the mixture into the prepared tin and lightly level the top. Bake on the middle shelf of the oven for 30-40 minutes, or until golden-brown on top and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.
- Remove from the oven and set aside to cool in the tin for 10 minutes, then turn it out on to a wire rack and leave to cool completely.
- To serve, decorate the cake with the candied peel.
You'll use: Oven
Watch how it's made
Hosted on YouTube — pressing play loads content from YouTube.
Ingredient substitutions
- Butter
- olive oil (¾ the amount) · coconut oil · margarine
- Eggs
- ¼ cup unsweetened applesauce (baking) · 1 tbsp ground flax + 3 tbsp water per egg
- Self-raising Flour
- 1 cup plain flour + 1½ tsp baking powder + ¼ tsp salt
- Milk
- any unsweetened plant milk · ½ cup evaporated milk + ½ cup water
What to serve with Madeira Cake
- Smoky Lentil Chili with Squash Vegetarian
- Fish pie Seafood
- Beef Wellington Beef
- Toad In The Hole Pork
Tips & common questions
How long does Madeira Cake take to make?
About 60 minutes from start to finish — an estimate based on the 7 steps and 7 ingredients. Times vary with your kitchen and how much prep you do ahead.
What can I use instead of butter?
Try olive oil (¾ the amount). See the substitutions section above for more swaps.
Can I scale this recipe up or down?
Yes — use the servings control above the ingredients and every quantity rescales automatically (fractions included). Cooking times stay roughly the same; very large batches may need a little longer.
Is Madeira Cake vegetarian?
Its ingredients contain no meat or fish, so it's suitable for vegetarians. Check any cheeses for animal rennet if that matters to you.
Related recipes
Recipe data for Madeira Cake via TheMealDB (open database). ▶ Video. Original source. Consomee adds the scaler, ingredient tools, timing and structure — how we source recipes.