Ben Dearnley
This beautiful celebration cake makes the most of delicious Middle Eastern flavours of pistachio and rosewater.
Looking for more impressive cakes?
Ingredients
Rosewater butter cream
Method
1.Preheat oven to 170°C (150°C).Grease a deep 22cm round cake pan;
line base and side with three layers of baking paper, extending the papers 5cm above the edge.
2.Blend or process 1 cup of the pistachios until finely ground. Coarsely chop remaining pistachios.
3.Beat butter, sugar and rind in a medium bowl with an electric mixer until light and creamy. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Stir in sifted flours, yoghurt and ground pistachios. Spread mixture into pan.
4.Bake cake for 1¼ hours or until a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean. Cover with foil if overbrowning. Leave cake in pan for 5 minutes before turning, top-side up, onto a wire rack to cool.
Rosewater buttercream
5.Beat butter and rosewater in a medium bowl with an electric mixer until as white as possible. Gradually beat in sifted icing sugar until smooth. Add enough of the milk to make the butter cream a spreadable consistency.
6.Split cake in half. Place base cake layer, cut-side up, onto a cake plate; spread with one-third of the butter cream, then top with remaining cake layer. Spread remaining buttercream over top and side of cake. Decorate top of cake with chopped pistachios.
