Tropical Chocolate Cake

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I seem to be making a lot of chocolate cakes lately, but this one is a bit different in that it has tropical flavours and ingredients.
 I found the recipe in a booklet I picked up at a food fair, and it's a cake I've been meaning to try. I found a bottle of rum in the back of the cupboard, and as well as my using it for Flognarde, a recipe you can find on  Phil's blog 'As Strong As Soup' , I'm going to use some in this cake [opt].
The tropical part comes from the creamed coconut, pineapple and dessicated coconut.

Preheat oven 180C/gas4 and grease and line a 20cm springform tin.

For the cake:

Cream together 100g soft butter and 200g caster sugar till pale and fluffy.
Stir in 60g melted chocolate and 2 egg yolks. Sift together 175g sr flour and 1 tspn mixed spice, then fold these into the batter with 4 tbspn creamed coconut, 3 tbspn milk and 1 tbspn rum [or you could use pineapple juice].
Beat the egg whites till stiff then gently fold them into the batter. Add 1 tbspn dessicated coconut and mix together.
Spoon into your tin and bake for about 45 mins till golden brown. Cool on a wire rack.

For the topping:

Whip 150ml double cream and pipe onto the cake, anyway you fancy. Decorate the cream with some pineapple chunks from a 200g tin [drained].

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The flavour of the coconut comes through well, but is not overpowering. Nice soft texture and a hint of rum. Topping finished off the cake nicely, and the pineapple chunks gave it another texture. An unusual cake, and one I'll make again.



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