Sourdough Passionfruit Cake

Meltingly soft, tangy and sweet, every forkful of this Sourdough Discard Passionfruit Cake is a delight. Free from dairy, eggs and sugar, it’s safe for those with sensitivities. Even better, you won’t feel deprived eating this healthy cake. It tastes indulgent…but it’s not!

Why You’ll Love this Recipe:

One Bowl Recipe: measure, mix and bake – this recipe is that simple! There are no separate mixes, just bung everything into the one bowl. Easy clean up, minimum fuss!
The option of fermentation: This recipe has sourdough discard, meaning that if you leave the batter to rest (sans the baking powders), the sourdough will work on the flour, making it easy to digest.
Great way to use up passionfruit: if you’ve a lot of fruit about to go off, transform them into a cake! This cake recipe has a lovely fruit flavour, and saves you from having mouldy fruit on your hands.
Great way to use up Sourdough Discard: if you’re needing to feed your starter or even to resurrect it, this recipe is your best friend! Using 2/3 cup, you’ll be able to give your sourdough starter a decent feeding afterwards.

Ingredients You’ll Need:

Sourdough Passionfruit Cake sounds intriguing, doesn’t it? I mean, how can you have sourdough and passionfruit in a cake, and make it delicious? Passionfruit, yes, but sourdough? Isn’t that stretching the Sourdough bandwagon a bit too far? Fear not, friends, as there is no hint of sourdough flavour in the baked cake (don’t taste the raw batter, though!).

Here’s a list of the ingredients you’ll need for this cake:

White or oat flour – I prefer to use white flour, because it gives a superior texture. Plus, I’m not a big fan of grinding oats for flour. When I make this cake, I just want to mix, leave it, and bake. But, if you have a sensitivity to flour and able to tolerate oats, then oat flour is the bomb! I have tried it with oat flour, and it still tastes amazing. To make oat flour, simply measure out the required quantity of oats, and blitz until fine.
Passionfruit pulp – this is the hero ingredient. We happen to have a passionfruit vine, and have lots of passionfruit at our disposal. If you do not have passionfruit, 1 cup of tinned passionfruit will suffice.
Sourdough discard – The sourdough discard allows for fermentation to happen, which tenderises the cake crumb and unlocks the nutrients. This makes the cake more easily digestible.
Oil – yes, this is an oil-based cake, making it more shelf-stable and infinitely more tender. I’m not vegan, but I prefer to use oil in cakes because it is easier to use, and makes a moister cake.
Truvia, or 2 cups sugar – I sometimes use a mix of Sugar and Truvia, to help with the budget. Sugar is way cheaper to bake with and it actually improves the final texture of the cake. It is fluffier, in my opinion. However, if you have an aversion to sugar (I swing to and fro), Truvia is the next best sweetener for this cake.
Salt – brings balance to the cake, and makes the flavours sing. Don’t skip this one!
White or cider vinegar – activates the baking soda and baking powder.
Baking powder and Baking soda are the main rising agents for the cake. They are added at the end just before baking to ensure they do not activate too soon. You do need quite a lot because this is a big cake, and it rises a fair amount in the oven!
Vanilla essence – slosh it in, baby! Vanilla Essence makes everything delicious.

Making the Sourdough Passionfruit Cake

This is a really easy cake to make! All you need is one bowl and a giant mixing spoon. If you want to ferment your cake, you need to think about when you want to bake it, and give yourself 7 hours minimum to ferment.

Or, if you are pressed for time, simply preheat the oven, mix all the cake ingredients, and bung it in! 75 minutes later you will have your beautiful cake.

Prepping the Batter

If you are wanting to ferment the cake batter to improve the digestibility of the cake, start the night before or early in the morning, to allow for a minimum of 7 hours fermentation.

To make the pre-ferment, mix all the ingredients for the cake batter except the baking powder, baking soda and vinegar.

Cover and leave at room temperature for a minimum of 7 hours or overnight.

Get Ready to Bake

After 7 hours or when you are ready to bake, preheat the oven to 160 degrees Celsius. Line a 22cm loose-bottomed cake tin with baking paper. (If you are wanting to skip fermentation, you should preheat the oven before you start mixing so that it is warmed up by the time the batter is ready).

To the pre-ferment mixture, add the baking powder, baking soda and vinegar. Be sure not to over-mix, but make sure the raising agents are evenly dispersed and fully absorbed.

Pour into the prepared cake tin, and place in the centre rack of the oven.

Bake for 75 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean.