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Yucatán's convent-era celebration cake: white camote and fresh coconut crushed atropellado with canela and clove, layered between sponge soaked in Jerez and crowned with a dramatic Italian meringue browned at the peaks.
This is from Yucatán. Specifically from Mérida, from the family dulcerías and the church-bazaar tables where postres like this one have been served at quinceañeras, weddings, and saint's day celebrations for generations. It is not a cake from a Mexico City pastelería. It is not a Oaxacan postre. It belongs to the peninsula, to the cooks who built a sugar tradition on white camote, fresh coconut, and the Spanish-inherited art of the merengue italiano.
The filling is what makes it. White camote, not the orange sweet potato most people know, boiled whole, peeled, then mashed directly into a hot syrup with finely grated fresh coconut, canela, and clove. The word atropellado means run over, crushed together, and that is exactly what you do: you crush the camote and the coconut into one body until they cannot be separated. The result is dense, perfumed, almost candy-like. Bagged coconut will not do this. Orange-fleshed sweet potato will not do this. Cada estado, su propia cocina, and Yucatán has its own ingredients.
The sponge gets soaked in Jerez seco, dry Spanish sherry, the same Jerez that arrived with the Spanish ships and stayed in the Yucatecan pantry alongside the alcaparrado and the queso de bola. The Italian meringue on top is not decoration. It is structural. Pulled into dramatic peaks and browned with a torch, it holds the cake together for two days and gives it the silhouette that Yucatecan dulceras have been pulling out of their kitchens for over a century.
My mother never made this cake. She was from Jalisco and her dessert tradition was rice pudding and capirotada. I learned this one in Mérida from a señora named doña Esther who ran a postre stall at the Mercado Lucas de Gálvez. She let me write down the recipe on the back of a napkin and told me, in Spanish that was half Maya, that if I served it without enough Jerez I should not bother making it at all. Saber cocinar es saber vivir.
Pastel atropellado belongs to the convent dessert tradition that flourished in colonial Yucatán, where Spanish nuns and criolla cooks adapted Iberian techniques like merengue and almíbar to the peninsula's native ingredients: camote, coconut, and the abundant sugar from the henequen-era haciendas. The white-fleshed camote (Ipomoea batatas), domesticated in Mesoamerica thousands of years before contact, was the preferred dulce-making variety in Yucatán long before the orange-fleshed cultivars gained commercial dominance elsewhere. The use of Jerez to soak sponges, rather than rum or local aguardiente, is a marker of the Spanish maritime trade route that connected Andalucía to Veracruz and then overland to Mérida, and it distinguishes Yucatecan postres from those of central and southern Mexico.
Quantity
2 pounds
scrubbed
Quantity
1
cracked, meat pried out and brown skin pared off
Quantity
2 cups
Quantity
1 cup
Quantity
2 sticks
Quantity
3
Quantity
1 strip
pared with a knife
Quantity
1/4 teaspoon
Quantity
6
at room temperature, separated
Quantity
1 cup
Quantity
1 cup
sifted twice
Quantity
1 teaspoon
Quantity
pinch
Quantity
1/2 cup
for soaking the sponge
Quantity
1/4 cup
equal parts sugar and water, cooled
Quantity
5
at room temperature
Quantity
1 1/2 cups
Quantity
1/2 cup
Quantity
1/4 teaspoon
Quantity
1/2 teaspoon
Quantity
for finishing
Quantity
for the platter
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| white camote (white-fleshed sweet potato)scrubbed | 2 pounds |
| mature fresh coconutcracked, meat pried out and brown skin pared off | 1 |
| granulated sugar (for the filling) | 2 cups |
| water (for the filling) | 1 cup |
| Mexican canela (Ceylon cinnamon) | 2 sticks |
| whole cloves | 3 |
| lime zestpared with a knife | 1 strip |
| fine sea salt | 1/4 teaspoon |
| large eggsat room temperature, separated | 6 |
| granulated sugar (for the sponge) | 1 cup |
| all-purpose floursifted twice | 1 cup |
| vanilla extract | 1 teaspoon |
| salt for the sponge | pinch |
| dry sherry or Jerez secofor soaking the sponge | 1/2 cup |
| simple syrupequal parts sugar and water, cooled | 1/4 cup |
| large egg whites (for the Italian meringue)at room temperature | 5 |
| granulated sugar (for the Italian meringue) | 1 1/2 cups |
| water (for the Italian meringue) | 1/2 cup |
| cream of tartar | 1/4 teaspoon |
| vanilla extract (for the meringue) | 1/2 teaspoon |
| fresh coconut shavings (optional) | for finishing |
| Mexican canela sticks (optional) | for the platter |
Place the whole white camotes in a large pot and cover with cold water by two inches. Bring to a simmer and cook, partially covered, for 35 to 45 minutes, until a knife slides through the thickest one with no resistance. Drain and let them sit until cool enough to handle. Peel off the skin with your fingers. The flesh should be pale, almost ivory. If you used orange-fleshed sweet potato, this is not the same dish. The white camote of Yucatán gives the postre its color and its mild, almost floral sweetness.
Crack the coconut by tapping firmly around its equator with the back of a heavy knife or hammer. Catch the water in a bowl and save it. Pry the meat out of the shell with a sturdy paring knife. Pare off the brown inner skin so only the white flesh remains. Grate the coconut on the small holes of a box grater. You should have about 2 1/2 cups of finely grated coconut. Bagged dried coconut is not a substitute. The fresh coconut gives the filling its moisture and its perfume. No me vengas con atajos.
In a heavy cazuela or wide saucepan, combine the 2 cups of sugar, 1 cup of water, the canela sticks, cloves, lime zest, and salt. Bring to a gentle boil over medium heat. Cook for 5 minutes until the syrup thickens slightly. Add the peeled camote and mash it directly into the syrup with a wooden spoon or potato masher. Add the grated coconut. Lower the heat and cook, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, for 20 to 25 minutes. The mixture will thicken, pull away from the sides of the pan, and turn glossy. This is the atropellado: the camote and coco crushed together, cooked into one body. When the spoon leaves a clean track across the bottom of the pan, it is ready. Fish out the canela, cloves, and lime zest. Let it cool completely.
Heat the oven to 350F. Line the bottom of a 9-inch round springform pan with parchment. Do not grease the sides. Whip the 6 egg yolks with 1/2 cup of the sugar and the vanilla on high speed for 4 to 5 minutes, until pale and thick enough to ribbon off the whisk. In a separate clean bowl, whip the 6 egg whites with the pinch of salt to soft peaks, then rain in the remaining 1/2 cup of sugar and whip to firm, glossy peaks. Fold one third of the whites into the yolks to lighten, then fold in the rest in two additions. Sift the flour over the top in three additions, folding gently with a spatula until no streaks remain. Pour into the pan and bake for 25 to 30 minutes, until the top springs back when pressed and the cake has pulled away from the sides. Cool completely in the pan.
Run a knife around the edge of the cooled sponge and release it from the pan. Slice the sponge horizontally into three even layers with a long serrated knife. Combine the dry sherry and the simple syrup in a small bowl. Brush each layer generously on both sides with the sherry syrup. The sponge should be moist but not soaked through. In Mérida this is called el almíbar, and a dry sponge here means a dry cake forever. Be generous.
Place the bottom sponge layer on a flat serving platter. Spread half of the cooled camote and coco atropellado over it in an even layer about 3/4 inch thick. Top with the middle sponge layer, press down gently, and spread the remaining atropellado over it. Set the top sponge layer over the filling and press the whole stack down with your palms so the layers settle and bond. Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes while you make the meringue. A cold cake holds its shape under the meringue.
Combine the 1 1/2 cups of sugar and 1/2 cup of water in a small heavy saucepan. Stir once to wet the sugar, then leave it alone. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat and cook, without stirring, until the syrup reaches 240F on a candy thermometer (soft-ball stage). While the syrup heats, begin whipping the 5 egg whites with the cream of tartar on medium speed until soft peaks form. The timing has to match: the syrup should hit 240F just as the whites reach soft peaks. With the mixer running on medium, pour the hot syrup down the side of the bowl in a thin, steady stream. Avoid the whisk itself or the syrup will spin into threads against the sides. Once all the syrup is in, raise the speed to high and whip for 6 to 8 minutes, until the bowl is no longer warm to the touch and the meringue is thick, glossy, and holds stiff peaks. Beat in the vanilla.
Pile the meringue generously on top of the chilled cake. Using an offset spatula, spread it across the top and down the sides in a thick, even coat. Then go back and pull the spatula up off the surface in quick motions to create peaks and swoops across the entire cake. This is how the dulcerias of Mérida finish their postres: dramatic peaks, not a smooth fondant finish. The texture is part of the dish.
Pass a kitchen torch lightly over the peaks until they take on a deep golden color, almost mahogany at the tips. Alternatively, place the cake under a hot broiler for 60 to 90 seconds, watching every second. Scatter fresh coconut shavings over the top. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours before slicing, ideally overnight. The cake needs time for the almíbar, the atropellado, and the meringue to settle into each other. Cut with a long serrated knife dipped in hot water and wiped clean between slices. Recetas probadas y garantizadas.
1 serving (about 240g)
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