Pineapple and coconut cake with coconut ice-cream by Ernie Curson

Ingredients
(Serves 10)

250g soft unsalted butter
200g caster sugar
50g Demerara sugar
5 whole eggs
175g soft flour
75g desiccated coconut
2g baking powder
50g pineapple (small dices)
10g dark rum or Malibu
200ml passion fruit juice
2tbs pineapple jam

To serve and decorate 15g mango coulis per person
1tbs desiccated coconut
Coconut ice-cream
Half a thinly sliced and dried pineapple

Method Preheat the oven to 180°C and grease the moulds. Cream butter and sugar. Warm the eggs to 37°C and mix it into the butter and sugar mixture. Sieve flour and baking powder. Mix it with the desiccated coconut and add the dry mixture to the rest of the ingredients. Fold in the diced pineapple.

Three-quarter fill the moulds and place them on a baking tray. Bake at 165°C for about 15 to 20 minutes. To check if they are cooked, insert a clean knife into one cake and if it comes out clean it is ready. Demould the cake, leave it to rest for five minutes, then dip in passion fruit juice mixed with the rum and leave to cool on a wire rack. Brush with melted pineapple jam and coat with desiccated coconut. Serve with mango sauce and coconut ice-cream.

Decoration tip: Thinly slice a whole fresh pineapple, soak the slices in syrup, and then dry on a baking tray in the oven on very low heat (80°C) for at least one hour. Stick the slices into the ice-cream.

By Ernie Curson, pastry chef, Grosvenor House, London