It seems like it’s been a while since I shared a recipe here. I’ve had this one in my back pocket for a while now - actually it was in early 2020 BC (Before Covid). It seems now is the perfect time to share - since we’re all expert bakers and bread makers after more than two months in AD (Acute Disease). Do you like what I did there?
Anyway, this recipe is a cinch! The hero ingredient is pineapple. Even though they’re not in season, I seem to be seeing pineapples in all the supermarkets lately. And by all, I mean my local Coles and Woolies Metro.
The cake is a silky sponge with tropical pineapple and coconut flavours, topped with a vanilla cream-cheese frosting. It’s kind of like a Pina Colada in cake form. All you need to add is rum instead of (I don’t know actually what you could substitute rum for) but I guess you could just pour some over the cake before you eat it. You can thank me later. I’ll accept hugs post-AD.
all the yummy ingredients - minus the rum!
Ingredients
butter, for greasing
280g (2 cups + 3 tbsp) self-raising flour
120g (1/2 cup) coconut sugar
120g (1/2 cup) caster sugar
100g (1 cup) desiccated coconut.
100g (1 cup) walnuts, finely chopped.
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
300g (about ⅓ pineapple) finely chopped fresh pineapple
3 large eggs, lightly beaten
100ml (about 1 cup - a little less) vegetable oil
dried pineapple and/or edible flowers and/or chopped pistachio nuts, to serve
Cream cheese frosting
400g cream cheese, softened
200g crème fraîche (I used regular thickened cream)
200g pure icing sugar
Scraped seeds of 1 vanilla bean
Method
Preheat oven to 175°C. Grease a 20cm x 30cm lamington tin and line with baking paper, leaving a little overhanging.
Combine flour, sugars, coconut, walnut and bicarbonate of soda in a bowl, add fresh pineapple, egg and oil and stir to combine.
Spread batter into prepared tin and bake until golden and cake springs back when lightly pressed (35 minutes).
Cool in tin (15 minutes), then lift out and cool completely on a wire rack.
For cream cheese frosting, beat ingredients in an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment until smooth.
Spread frosting over cake and top with dried pineapple, flowers and/or pistachio to serve.
Drink suggestion: Do I really need to tell you?
I’d love to hear if that first bite takes you straight to a warm tropical island where ISO is not an issue.