Rice cooker orange cake

It's already several weeks ago that I suddenly got the idea to use my rice cooker to make a cake. I was talking to some friends about cooking and our favourite food, and I recounted my many baking experiments back home. I don't have an oven here though, so I always thought it wouldn't be possible to make cakes at my Chinese home.
The rice cooker idea was not that far-fetched though. After some googling it appeared quite a popular and even proven method. There are numerous recipes to be found online for baking cakes in a rice cooker. Many of them mention the fancy micro-computer controlled rice cookers which even have a build-in menu option for making cakes, out of the box, recipes included. Mine is a cheap (99 RMB) affair, which only has a cook / keep warm switch, which automatically switches over once the rice is ready. It always produces perfectly cooked rice, provided you added the right amount of water.
To make my orange cake, I used the most simple cake recipe, and improvised a bit on it, based on my own experience back home. Beat 4 eggs and 125 g sugar until fluffy, add a tablespoon of oil (butter is hard to find and expensive in China), and the same amounts of milk, finely chopped orange rind, the juice of that same orange, and some brandy. Then fold in 200 g of flour and pour the mixture in the rice cooker pot. I greased the pot with some oil, but it has a non-stick teflon coating anyway.
I was supposed to bake the cake for about 30 minutes, but already 5 minutes after switching it on, it switched into keep warm mode. Obviously the cake wasn't done yet, so I tried to switch it on again. The build-in thermostat prevented me from doing that, so I had to force the rice cooker to stay in cook mode, by inserting some object in the gap between the switch and its surrounding recess. I had read some online trick about using an eraser for this purpose, but I found the handle of my kitchen knife perfectly suitable for the job.
My engineer's mind told me that overruling the thermal protection of a high power electrical appliance is potentially hazardous, possibly resulting in a meltdown or catching fire. So I watched it carefully for early signs of damage or overheating. When water vapour was streaming out of the steam vent I removed the jam, and let it cool off a bit, re-applying the blocker a bit later. I repeated this a few times, until I thought the cake should be about ready.
The smell emanating from the steam vent was quite pleasant, but it did have a faint hint of burn. I eagerly opened the lid, and saw a nicely golden yellow surface, dotted with small craters, not unlike the surface of the moon. This was actually a good sign, I thought, since it meant there was enough air in the mixture to make it a cake, instead of a brick.
It was impossible to remove it in one piece however. The bottom did burn, and had the whole thing firmly stuck. I had to cut it in-place, and remove the cake in four quarters, minus the bottom layer. Thus far, it did not look all too bad, and the taste was actually quite OK. A bit too dry, the steam I had seen escaping was responsible for that, but the taste was good. Thanks to the orange rind and the brandy, no doubt.
Nonetheless, I don't think I will redo this experiment. My simple rice cooker is best used for its intended purpose: cooking rice.