Cranberry and White Chocolate Bundt Cake

It's got to that time of year again, when I can't face another cheese board and reached that chocolate overload limit. But of course, there's nothing wrong with a bit of cake and I thought this would be the best way to use up those leftover cranberries which have been hanging out in my fridge for the past week now from Christmas day (I just couldn't throw them away!!) as well as putting to good use those obligatory christmas nuts which nobody ate. 

I also happened to have some dried cranberries which must have been from last year's christmas which I used to decorate the top with. Ah well, they tasted fine to me so why not! I chucked all of the fresh ones into the cake itself, forgetting that I was going to sugar coat some for decoration. You could still do that if you fancied but I found that dried ones on top worked really well for supplying another texture and they wouldn't bleed juices into the white chocolate. 

On another note, being a new year n' all that, I'd like to wish all my readers a happy, joyful and exciting new year for 2017, full of great, delicious food too of course. Oh and let's celebrate with this cake... hehe!

Cranberry  and  White  Chocolate  Bundt  Cake

Makes enough for one large bundt shaped tin (2 litres)

Ingredients

Vegetable oil or cake release spray for greasing 200 g (1 cup)  butter (room temperature) 100 g (½ cup) caster sugar 100g (½ cup) soft light brown sugar 1 tbsp vanilla extract 4 eggs (room temperature) 350 g (2 + 1⁄4 cup) plain flour (all-purpose flour) + extra for dusting 2 tbsp baking powder 1 tsp ground cinnamon 25 g (2 tbsp) cornstarch (corn flour) 1 pinch of salt 150g (3/5 cups)  natural plain yoghurt 150 g (1 + 1⁄4 cup) fresh cranberries
For the top: 130g ( ¾ cup) white chocolate, melted 20g (1⁄4 cup) dried cranberries 10g (2 tbsp) pistachios, chopped finely

Method

Preheat the oven to 170°C/ 325°F/ gas 3. Grease the bundt tin with vegetable oil or cake release spray. Then sieve a little flour in the tin to coat the insides of the tin, tap off excess. Cream the butter, both sugars and vanilla extract until smooth and fluffy, Beat in the eggs.
Mix the flour, baking powder, cinnamon, cornstarch and salt in a separate bowl and then fold into the creamed batter. Fold in the yoghurt and fresh cranberries kept whole. Spoon into the prepared tin and level out. Bake for approximately 45 minutes, or until a skewer inserted comes out clean. 
Once baked, take straight out of the oven and place onto a damp tea towel. This helps to release it from the tin. Leave to cool in its tin for 5 minutes then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
To finish, pour over the white chocolate, using a spoon to drizzle in an attractive manner so it drips down the sides. Scatter over the dried cranberries and chopped pistachios. Leave the chocolate to set before cutting. Store in an airtight container.