High Level Baking Question. 400g of macadamia nuts are involved.

[Slubberdegullion]

My sister and bil are coming for dinner on saturday.

For pudding I was going to serve This Macadamia Fudge Cake but being the giant airhead that I am I have forgotten my sister is on a wheat free diet atm, and I have already gone and bought all the stuff...oh and then I smashed the bottle of sodding rum all over the arsing nuts so I can't even take them back.
[clutz]

The recipe calls for 75g of plain flour. I was thinking that maybe I could swap that for ground almonds but then as the macadamia nuts are all ground up to a powder then maybe I can omit the flour altogether, and tweak the other ingredients a bit.

Or would that make it go all WRONG?

Should I do something different with the nuts altogether?

hellfireanddamnation @ my sister's bowels

Hmmm, tbh, I would do something completely different. Tis ok doing a trial run of something and altering the ingredients, but if it is for something special, then no. Me thinks it would go completely wrong.

That cake looks fab. I cut the recipe out on saturday, and I was going to make it the next time I had people round for dinner.

Please, please make it and tell me what it's like. I would add another 75g of the ground nuts and see if it worked. The only thing that might happen is that it won't rise, but I'm sure your sister will understand.

Report back!

bella, my sister isn't that special , if it all goes tits up we can just have the creme fraiche and a macadamian mouuse.

I'm very tempted Mrs M to do just that. I think the rise is with the beaten egg whites, the flour is just for a bit more binding...or maybe it is the binding???

Surely the macadamia nuts will behave in the same way that ground almonds would in a non flour cake.

I'm not an expert of nut properties.

Use ground almonds instead of the flour + the macadamia nuts, should be fine but may not rise as much as it would with flour, you could always add some GF baking powder (if you have some).

I worked in a GF bakery for 4 years, we used ground almonds a lot.

I didn't know that you could get such a thing. I have to go back to sainsbury's tomorrow to buy another bottle of rum, so I'll go and have a look.

Try rice flour. Am a pastry chef and allergic to wheat- I usually replace flour with rice flour. You can use ground almonds too but it will have a moister denser texture.
HTH

Oh but I do like a moist dense texture

What do you think the plain flour is actually for? 75g of the stuff seems neither here nor there really what with all the sugar and chocolate and nuts.

Who doesn't?
The flour is to bind the ingredients and support the cake structure. You could skip it but the meringue might collapse when it comes out of the oven without it.
Have you done this kind of cake before? I would highly recommend using a kenwood or such for the egg whites, it's a killer on the right arm...

Yes I've got an electric handmixer, thank goodness.

I've done all ground almond cakes before, but not one that uses a bit of flour. yes I see what you mean about the egg whites collapsing. I'll get some rice flour.

Thanks very much for the advice.

It'll be lovely, Dan Lepard is ace

Please come back and tell us if you made this, and if it was as delicious as it sounds.

Cake Feedback:

Well I made it with the rice flour. I don't know whether it was meant to collapse spectacularly in the middle, or it was the rice rather than normal flour, or whether I took it out of the oven too early, or perhaps I didn't fold in the egg whites convincingly (he did say to just barely fold them in)

anyway the thing did look like a complete dog's dinner.

It did taste pretty good though

It is spectacularly rich, teetering on the edge of 'oh no that is just TOO much' rich. The creme fraiche held it back from the brink. You couldn't have seconds of it, your teeth would all drop out and you would be unable to do much more than schlump back in your chair, belch and rub your distended belly.

The only other thing is that it is HUGE it is a monster of a cake, could serve 20 easily which is a bit of a problem if you are only cooking it for 4 or if you intend to serve it at a big party but the finished result looks like you have thrown it down the stairs.

Not sure if I will do it again. It is an uber rich chocolate cake if that is your bag.

When I saw the ingredient quantities, I did wonder if it was a for a crowd.

I'm not a fan of too sweet, so I maybe won't bother.

Thanks for being the guinea pig!