Pé de Moleque Pernambucano

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •9-inch round cake pan or 2-liter oven-safe clay baking form
• •Parchment paper or softened banana leaf
• •Small saucepan
• •Food processor or mortar for grinding peanuts
• •Clean kitchen towel for squeezing cassava if needed

Instructions

1. 1

   Prepare the pan

   For a metal 9-inch round pan or 8-inch square pan, heat the oven to 180°C (350°F). Grease the pan with butter and line the bottom with parchment or a softened banana leaf, smooth side up. The lining is not decoration; this is a sticky cassava cake, and the leaf, when you have it, gives a quiet green aroma and lets the slice lift cleanly. If you're using an oven-safe clay form, don't preheat the oven; fill the form later, put it in cold, then set the heat to 180°C and expect 10 to 15 extra minutes.

   Clay gives a deeper crust, but it hates sudden shocks. Use only an oven-safe clay form and keep it away from direct cold-to-hot drama.
2. 2

   Grind the peanuts

   Set aside 2 tablespoons of peanuts for the top. Pulse the rest in a food processor, or crush them in a mortar, until you have a coarse meal with a few small nubs left. Stop before they turn oily. You want peanut flavor and texture in the cake, not peanut paste, and warm peanuts cross that line fast.

3. 3

   Make the syrup

   Put the mel de engenho, rapadura, coffee, cinnamon, fennel, cloves, and salt in a small saucepan over low heat. Stir until the rapadura dissolves and the kitchen smells like cane and spice, about 3 to 5 minutes. Don't boil it hard. You're dissolving and perfuming, not making candy. Take it off the heat and let it cool until the pan feels warm, not hot, about 15 to 20 minutes.

   Hot syrup meeting eggs gives you cooked egg flecks. Anota aí: if it feels too hot against your wrist, it is too hot for the batter.
4. 4

   Loosen the cassava

   Put the massa de mandioca in a large sturdy bowl and crumble it with your fingers until it looks like damp, loose crumbs. Pull out any tough fibers you find. If water puddles in the bowl, wrap the massa in a clean towel and squeeze just until damp, not dry. Cassava lumps bake into heavy pockets, and too much water leaves the middle gummy.

5. 5

   Mix the liquids

   Whisk the eggs until smooth, then whisk in the room-temperature coconut milk and the melted, cooled butter. Pour in the cooled spiced syrup slowly, whisking as you go. The leite de coco needs to be at room temperature so the butter doesn't set into little beads, and the syrup needs to be cool so the eggs stay silky instead of scrambling. A scrambled egg cake is a betrayal nobody needs.

6. 6

   Build the batter

   Pour the liquids over the cassava and stir with a wooden spoon until every pale crumb turns dark and there are no dry pockets. Fold in the ground peanuts and grated coconut. The batter should be thick and heavy, like spoonable porridge, and smell like cane, peanut, and spice. Let it rest for 10 minutes so the cassava drinks the liquid; skipping the rest leaves dry specks in a cake that should be dense and even.

7. 7

   Bake it dark

   Scrape the batter into the prepared pan, smooth the top, and scatter over the reserved peanuts. For metal, bake in the preheated oven for 70 to 85 minutes. For clay, put the filled form in a cold oven, set it to 180°C (350°F), and start checking around 85 minutes. The cake is done when the top is deep mahogany, the edges pull from the pan, the center no longer sloshes, and a skewer comes out with moist crumbs, not wet paste. Cassava needs time to cook through; pull it early and the middle is gummy, bake it until dry and it turns stubborn.

8. 8

   Cool and slice

   Cool the cake in the pan for at least 45 minutes before slicing. I know. Annoying. But hot cassava cake tears and looks raw even when it's cooked; resting lets the starch set. Slice with a small knife wiped between cuts and serve at room temperature, or wrap it and eat it the next day when the spice tastes deeper.

Chef Tips

• •This is massa de mandioca, not farinha de mandioca, tapioca starch, or polvilho. The wrong cassava product won't hydrate into this cake. It gives you sand or glue, and you will think you failed. You didn't. The bag did.
• •Frozen massa de mandioca is the honest shortcut. Thaw it in the fridge, squeeze only if it puddles water, and accept that freshly grated cassava has a brighter smell. That's a fair trade on a Tuesday.
• •Use mel de engenho if you can find it; dark cane syrup or unsulfured molasses works. Avoid blackstrap molasses here. It's too bitter and takes over the cake.
• •Coconut milk from a can is fine when it's just coconut and water. Coconut milk powder or cake mix, no. There's saving time, and then there's paying someone to remove the food from your food.
• •Don't taste raw cassava batter. Cassava is meant to be cooked through. Check doneness with the skewer and the center, not with a spoonful from the bowl.
• •The cake should be dense, not fluffy. Don't add wheat flour to make it behave like pound cake. Pé de moleque pernambucano is cassava speaking in its own accent.

Advance Preparation

• •Thaw frozen massa de mandioca overnight in the fridge. Use it within 24 hours and squeeze it only if water pools around it.
• •Peanuts can be toasted, skinned, and ground up to 1 week ahead. Store them sealed so they stay fragrant.
• •This cake is better the next day. Cool completely, wrap well, and keep at cool room temperature overnight. Refrigerate after that and bring to room temperature before serving.
• •Baked pé de moleque keeps for 5 days in the fridge. Slice only what you need so the cut face doesn't dry out.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 155g)