Appetite | Soak up a rum cake

As a baker, I appreciate the power of a food bribe. I once landed a date based only on the power of a freshly-baked cherry pie. And goodness knows I've gotten my spouse to do any number of chores by point out, "I just made you cookies."

So recently someone suggested I make him a rum cake in exchange for a favor. I'm considering it. Of course, this person's failure was in doing me the favor first and expecting the bribe afterward. Tsk tsk. He'll have to wait and see if the gratitude and goodness of my heart is strong enough to follow through. It may not be.

But anyway, I've never made a rum cake. I used to have a coworker that made just a to-die for rum cake for all our company potlucks, but I never got the recipe. So I've been cruising the web looking for inspiration. A lot of them have coconut and pineapple, which sort of invokes the pina colada, and that appeals to me. But some people feel really strongly about coconut, so instead I think I'll go with this recipe, which just involves pineapple, and is a trifle presentation (one of those cakes layered ina pretty glass dish. Thankfully, for this one you don't need the dish. It's just layered.)

Pineapple Rum Trifle Cake

Epicurious.com

parchment paper
1/4 cup (1 1/2 ounces) shelled natural pistachios or blanched almonds
3/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
5 large eggs
2/3 cup sugar

two 20-ounce cans unsweetened crushed pineapple
rum sabayon
1 cup well-chilled heavy cream
2 teaspoons sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Oil bottom and sides of a 15 1/2 x 10 1/2 x 1-inch jelly-roll pan and line bottom and sides with parchment paper.

In a food processor finely grind nuts with flour and salt. In a large bowl with an electric mixer beat together eggs and sugar until thick and pale and mixture forms a ribbon when beaters are lifted (about 10 minutes with a standing mixer or about 15 with a hand-held mixer). Fold flour mixture into egg mixture gently but thoroughly. Spread batter evenly in jelly-roll pan and bake in middle of oven until golden and springs back when lightly touched, 10 to 15 minutes. Cool cake layer in pan on a rack. Cake layer may be made 3 days ahead and kept wrapped well in plastic wrap at cool room temperature.

In a food processor pulse undrained pineapple 3 seconds. Drain pineapple in a sieve set over a bowl (you will have about 2 cups) and reserve juice for another use.

Assemble trifle cake:

Invert cake layer onto a work surface and peel off parchment. With a long serrated knife trim layer to form a 14 x 7-inch rectangle, reserving trimmings. Halve rectangle crosswise to form two 7-inch squares and carefully halve squares horizontally (for a total of four 7-inch squares). Horizontally halve reserved trimmings.

Put 1 square on a cake plate. With a spatula spread 1/2 cup pineapple evenly over square. Top pineapple with 1/2 cup sabayon, spreading evenly. Make more layers in same manner with remaining 3 squares, pineapple, and sabayon, ending with sabayon. Piece together enough reserved trimmings to form a fifth square over sabayon. Chill cake, covered, at least 1 hour and up to 2 days.

In a bowl with an electric mixer beat cream with sugar until it just holds soft peaks and with a spatula spread whipped cream over top and sides of cake. Cake may be fully assembled 1 day ahead and chilled in a cake keeper or covered with an inverted bowl. Bring cake to room temperature before serving (about 30 minutes).