Pineapple, Passion Fruit And Pistachio Cake

Inside the monthly Waitrose magazine, there is usually a little booklet tucked away, exhibiting recipes on a particular theme. Recently the booklet I harvested was called “Brilliant Bakes” and I decided I would like to try every recipe it contained. This was the first of the recipes I tried and will be sharing with you.

I am going to acknowledge that it looks a bit of a mess, but it tastes extraordinarily delicious! I took lots of photos during this bake, but I am reaching the limit of my storage on WordPress so I need to be reserved with the number of photos I use in each post.

INGREDIENTS

140g unsalted butter (plus extra for greasing)
100g pistachios
1 large pineapple
2 large passion fruits
40g light brown soft sugar (plus 1tsp to sprinkle over the pineapple)
100g ground almonds
50g self-raising flour
200g golden caster sugar
4 eggs

METHOD

Preheat the oven to 190 /Gas mark 5. Grease and line a 23cm round springform cake tin.

Put the pistachios onto a baking tray and bake for five minutes. They will become fragrant and golden. Set them aside to cool.

Cut the skin away from the pineapple. Slice 5 thin rings, and remove the cores. Put one of the rings in the middle of the cake tin. Halve the other four rings, and then arrange them around the central pineapple ring.

Spread the flesh of one passion fruit over the pineapple and sprinkle 1tbsp of light brown soft sugar over the top.

Chop the rest of the pineapple into 1cm chunks, removing the core, until you have around 260g. Transfer the pineapple chunks to a baking tray and roast in the oven for eight minutes. Set aside to cool.

Melt the 100g butter. Place the toasted pistachios into a food processor and blitz until finely ground. Add the ground almonds, flour, caster sugar, eggs and the melted butter. Whizz again until combined. The fold into the mix the cooled roasted pineapple chunks.

Pour the mixture into the baking tin on top of the pineapple base. Bake for thirty minutes, and then loosely cover with foil after thirty minutes. Bake for another ten-fifteen minutes, until a skewer inserted into the center comes out clean.

Leave to cool in the tin for fifteen minutes before turning onto onto a serving plate to cool completely.

Just before serving, melt the remaining 40g butter along with 40 soft brown sugar in a small pan and over a low-medium heat. Stir to combine. Then add the flesh of the other passion fruit and cook for a minute to make a passion fruit syrup. Drizzle over the cake ready to serve.