Strawberry Watermelon Cake

This cake has a cult following. It’s the signature cake from Newtown’s Black Star Pastry. This recipe appeared in Gourmet Traveller a while ago and it has taken me until now to get around to making it. I’ve adapted the recipe slightly and used a round cake tin instead of a square one.

It’s actually not all that hard to make and I think well worth the effort. It basically has three main components : two layers of almond dacquoise ( like a meringue); rose-scented cream; watermelon and strawberries; and garnished with slivered pistachios and dried rose petals.

There are plenty of how-to videos on-line too.

Daquoise ingredients

Add almond/ icing sugar to beaten egg whites

Cooked Daquoise

soften sheet gelatin

Add melted gelatine to whipped cream

layer the cake

cake topping

refrigerate for at least 3 hours

Ingredients

• 250 gm seedless watermelon, thinly sliced; or one large slice to fit cake tin
• 60 ml (¼ cup) rosewater
• 4 tablespoons caster sugar
• 40 gm almond meal

Almond dacquoise

• 150 gm slivered almonds
• 150 gm pure icing sugar, sieved
• 5 eggwhites
• 135 gm caster sugar

Rose-scented cream

• 600 ml thickened cream
• 30 gm caster sugar
• 2 tablespoons rosewater
• 2 sheets titanium strength ( 5g) gelatin

To garnish

• 500 gm strawberries (about 2 punnets), halved
• 100g seedless red grapes, halved
• handful of slivered pistachios
• 1 tablespoon dried rose petals (optional)
• red current jelly to glaze (optional)

Method

For almond dacquoise

1. Preheat oven to 200°C.
2. Process almonds and icing sugar in a food processor until the almonds are finely ground.
3. Whisk eggwhites in an electric mixer until soft peaks form (3-4 minutes), then gradually add caster sugar and whisk until stiff peaks form (1-2 minutes).
4. Gently fold through almond mixture, spread or pipe, two circles of the mixture, a little bigger than your cake tin,( I used a 23cm springform tin) onto two oven trays lined with baking paper and bake until golden (10-15 minutes). Set aside to cool on tray.
5. Arrange watermelon slices in a single layer on a wire rack. Sprinkle with 20ml rosewater, then scatter with 2 tablespoons sugar.
6. Stand to macerate (30 minutes), then pat dry with absorbent paper.

For the rose-scented cream

7. Cover the gelatine sheets with cold water in a heat proof bowl and allow to soften.
8. Drain off almost all the water and microwave the gelatin for about 15 seconds or until just melted. Cool, add the rosewater and stir.
9. Whisk cream and sugar in an electric mixer until soft peaks form, gradually add rosewater/ gelatin mix and whisk until stiff peaks form (do not over-whisk)

To assemble the cake

10. Line the base and sides of a springform tin with baking paper. If you have access to some clear acetate from your local cake shop, use that to line the sides of the tin.
11. Lay one daquoise in the base of the tin, using the removable collar of your cake tin as your size guide.
12. Spread or pipe one-third of rose cream evenly over the dacquoise, scatter with half the almond meal.
13. Top with watermelon slice or slices, again, use the cake tins’ removable collar as your size guide, trim to fill any gaps. Scatter over remaining almond meal.
14. Spread or pipe over half remaining cream. Top with the second dacquoise, spread over remaining cream and refrigerate until firm (1-2 hours).
15. Combine strawberries, remaining rosewater and remaining sugar in a bowl, toss to combine and set aside to macerate (15 minutes). Carefully arrange on top of cake, gently pushing into cream.
16. Refrigerate for 3 hours.
17. Lightly brush the berries with melted redcurrant jelly or melted and sieved apricot jam, if you wish.
18. Scatter over grapes and pistachios and lastly the petals, if using
19. Carefully remove the cake tin collar and transfer onto a serving plate.

Notes

I bought a half watermelon, and was able to cut one full slice to fit the cake tin. After listening to chef Christopher The’, on one video, I added 2 sheets of titanium gelatin (5g each) to the cream, to ensure the cake cut more easily.