Mandarin and Pineapple Sage Flower Cake

1

Mandarin and Pineapple Sage Flower Cake is a flourless cake that is moist, rich in flavour and not overly sweet. Here’s how to make it.

Growing Pineapple Sage (Salvia elegans) in my garden has been a revelation. The more I use pineapple sage flowers, the more I discover their versatility in the kitchen and the home bar. This recipe came to be when all I had in the fridge was a few mandarins and an abundance of pineapple sage flowers I have been harvesting daily from my garden.

The method for making the cake starts with boiling whole mandarins and blitzing them in a food processor. The batter is prepared by beating eggs and sugar, adding almond meal, baking powder and pineapple sage flowers. The cake has no flour, no butter, no olive oil or yoghurt. It’s super tasty, rich and moist, and finished with a generous drizzle of pineapple sage flower honey (click for recipe).

Mandarin and Pineapple Sage Flower Cake

Original Recipe by Corinne Mossati

Ingredients

For the Cake

• 3 large mandarins, whole (or 4 small mandarins)
• 200g / 2 cups of almond meal
• 4 eggs
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 cup pineapple sage flowers

Topping

• pineapple sage flower honey for drizzling
• pineapple sage flowers

Method

1. Line a 20cm springform pan with baking paper.
2. In a saucepan, bring water to the boil, add the whole mandarins and simmer for 45 min ensuring they remain submerged at all times.
3. Carefully remove the mandarins from the pan, cut into quarters and remove any seeds.
4. Add the mandarins including the peel to a food processor and blitz. It makes approximately 1.5 cups.
5. In a medium sized bowl, beat the eggs and sugar until well combined.
6. Add almond meal, mandarin pulp and stir well to combine.
7. Pour the batter into the prepared springform pan and bake in a fan-forced oven at 160^oC for 30-45 minutes or until it’s just brown on top or an inserted skewer comes out clean. Note: You do not want to over cook it.
8. Leave to cool in the pan then unmould.
9. Garnish with pineapple sage flowers.
10. To serve, drizzle the pineapple sage flower infused honey on top.

Note: If you’re short on almond meal, you can use 100g almond meal and 100g of plain flour. The cake won’t be as moist and you’ll need to reduce the baking time.

You may also like… Quince and Pineapple Sage Flowers Crumble