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+ servings

Coconut and Pistachio Battenberg

5 from 1 vote
Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 30 minutes
Assembly Time 1 hour
Course Snack
Servings 8 people

Ingredients
  

  • 160 g unsalted butter, softened
  • 175 g caster sugar
  • 140 g self-raising flour
  • 50 g dessicated coconut
  • ½ teaspoon baking powder
  • 3 eggs
  • ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 tablespoon pistachio paste
  • ½ teaspoon almond extract
  • 500 g marzipan (or 1kg if making mini Battenbergs)
  • powdered sugar for dusting
  • apricot jam

Instructions
 

  • Preheat oven to 180C/160C Fan (350°F) and prepare a 20cm (9") square pan for your battenberg cake baking. The easiest way to do this is to use aluminium foil to create a divider in your pan, so that you will have two roughly equal cakes in one tin. Then line the two spaces with parchment paper.
  • In an electric mixer, beat together butter, sugar, flour, coconut, baking powder, eggs and vanilla until a smooth batter.
  • Divide batter evenly into two separate bowls - the recipe makes about 650g of mix, so your two bowls should have approximately 325g in each.
  • In one bowl, add 1 tablespoon of pistachio paste and a couple of drops of green gel food colouring. Whisk together until well incorporated. In the second bowl, add ½ teaspoon of almond extract.
  • Pour the batters into the two sides of your cake tin and bake for about 30 minutes, until a skewer comes out clean. Check both cakes at a point near the centre of the tin.
  • Remove from the oven and let cool for about half an hour before removing from the tin.
  • For assembly - if making a full-size Battenberg, trim the tops and sides of the cakes to be even. Then slice the cakes each in half length-wise and stack these in the classic checkerboard pattern. If making miniature versions, you will need to do considerably more cutting and trimming, but the aim is still the same pattern, more detailed directions in the blog post above.
  • Roll out marzipan into a long rectangle, about .5cm thickness. If making one Battenburg you will want this to be a bit over 20cm (9") wide and then long enough to roll around the cake. If making miniature Battenbergs, the measurements will vary, but again have the same goal of wrapping each individual cake.
  • Heat some apricot jam (or apricot and vanilla jam) and use this to sandwich together the cakes. Then coat the outside of the cake and fold the marzipan around this.
  • Trim the cake ends to finish the cake and decorate with leftover marzipan.
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