Here’s another recipe that came this close to not appearing on The Healthy Foodie…

Oh, not because the cake wasn’t good, far from there. It was actually delicious.

Only because I made a stupid mistake, which made my cake look sort of ugly and  I wasn’t conviced that I wanted to immortalize the evidence of my little mishap.

The truth is, I felt a little bit ashamed, you see… Hey, I am a certified pastry chef, after all. I shouldn’t be doing things like that. Not me. No way…

Do things like what, you ask?

Well… alright, I’ll show you. Take a look and see for yourself…

See that not so good looking egde? Well, it should’ve been all nice and beautiful and golden and mouth watering… it SHOULD have been a thing of beauty, really, judging by what the cake looked like BEFORE I took it out of the pan; all golden and crispy looking…

But you see, when came time to unmold the cake, I got overly excited and was so eager to free this baby from its metal harness, that I completely forgot to run a blade around it before to flip it onto a plate…

Of  course, the cake attached to the pan and sort of ripped all around, leaving all the delicious crustiness behind.

What a shame. I should’ve taken pictures of that egde still attached to the pan, just so I would remember how gorgeous it SHOULD’VE looked.

Or maybe I could just bake another cake….

In fact, that would be a brilliant idea, especially since I have 2 pineapples still that need to be used up. Yeah, I did get carried away once again and bought a whole bunch when they went on sale a few weeks ago…

And I can’t say I would oppose having some of that wonderful cake for breakfast all week again. Hey, I guess you guys know by now just how much I love having cake for breakfast…

And this one right here sure fits the purpose. It’s almost as though it was created with breakfast in mind.

Oh, wait… it was! Breakfast is EXACTLY what I had in mind when I came up with this recipe. Of course, that doesn’t mean that you can’t enjoy it for dessert, or as a healthy morning or afternoon snack.

It would be absolutely perfect for that too! It really isn’t that sweet at all, and it’s super dense and chewy and has tons of little morsels to chew on. And talk about tasty too!

Oh, and did I mention if was also grain free?

Oh yeah! I want me some more…

UPSIDE DOWN PINEAPPLE CAKE
[Grain Free, Gluten Free, No Sugar Added, Low Fat]
(serves 10-12)

INGREDIENTS

  • 1 small fresh pineapple, cut into thin chunks
  • 225g buckwheat flour
  • ¼ cup flax seed meal
  • ½ cup unsweetened shredded coconut
  • 2 tsp cream of tartar
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • ¼ tsp salt
  • 225g almond meal (I used leftover from milk)
  • 1 cup unsweetened apple sauce
  • 1 cup buttermilk
  • ½ cup date paste* (see note)
  • 1 cup (8) egg whites
  • ¼ tsp almond extract
  • 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
  • 1 tbsp white wine (or white balsamic) vinegar
  • Toasted coconut shavings to garnish

 DIRECTIONS

  1. Preheat the oven to 350F and spray a 9″ springform cake pan with cooking spray (a deep cake pan would also work)
  2. Arrange the chunks of pineapple nicely at the bottom of the pan. Set aside
  3. Add buckwheat flour, flaxseed meal, coconut, cream of tartar, baking soda and salt to a large mixing bowl and mix with a whisk until well combined.
  4. In a separate bowl, add almond meal, applesauce, buttermilk, date paste, egg whites, almond extract, vinegar and vanilla. Whisk until well incorporated.
  5. Add liquid mixture to dry mixture and mix with a rubber spatula until well incoporated.
  6. Pour that cake batter over the pineapple slices and cook in a 350F oven for 50minutes, or until top is nice and golden.
  7. Take out of the oven and allow to cool completely, at least 2 hours, then transfer to refrigerate for another 2 hours
  8. RUN THIN BLADE ALL AROUND THE CAKE then flip onto a clean pate.
  9. Garnish with toasted coconut shavings.

* To make date paste, simply pack a glass jar (Mason type) full of pitted dates then top with water. Put that in the fridge for 24 hours then process in the food processor until nice and smooth then transfer back to the jar. This will keep for several weeks in the refrigerator.