Bling or Spring? Primrose Panatonne Pudding

Primrose Panatonne Pudding

I invented this pudding for three reasons. Firstly because today heralds the start of Spring and we should not let that go without a bit of a celebration. Secondly and on a practical note, I was given a large panatonne at Christmas and need to use it up and lastly and most importantly because I am a big, big fan of alliterations!

This is a huge pudding and will easily feed 14 +. It is hard to describe other than being the very best bits of the following - danish pastry; bread and butter pud; trifle; and a truly great gateaux. It needs a very sharp knife to cut and a spoon to eat.

Best bit of all is that (except for making the primrose curd) there is no cooking involved at all so it might be one for the kiddies to have a crack at for Mothers' Day! Although perhaps leave out the booze if you are going to let the children have a slice. 

Ingredients

1 kg panettone

6 tablespoons of summer dessert wine

3 tablespoons of elderflower cordial

Primrose curd (see recipe here )

(alternatively use lemon curd or double cream or both!)

Primrose or primula flowers

Decide at this stage if you are going to make the primrose curd or use regular lemon and prepare accordingly. 

Unwrap and place the panattone on it's side and depending upon how many you are feeding, or how greedy they are, or then slice four slices of about two inch in thickness.  

Place each of these on a layer of cling film. Mix the wine and cordial together and drizzle evenly over the slices. This combination is lovely and summerly and sets off the cake beautifully but if you could also use limoncello or sherry if you prefer – or just cordial if you’d rather avoid the booze. For the ‘lid’ or top of the pudding just turn the slice upside down (ie cut side up!) and then sprinkle with the last of the liquid. You don’t want to add so much that the outer crust gets soggy so use you judgement and add any surplus to the other layers or your glass.

Place your bottom layer of cake onto your serving dish and spread a generous dollop of primrose curd onto the surface and cover with the next layer of cake. You can add seasonal berries as you go if you wish but you might well loose the subtle floral flavour if you do so. You can also swirl layers of curd with double cream. (We are nothing if not flexible in our imaginations!). Alternately layer the curd and slices until you have reconstructed the panatonne.

From here it can go one of two ways.

Spring

Simple and spring like. At this point pop in the fridge until just before you plan to eat it when you should sprinkle with icing sugar and garnish with fresh edible primroses. It goes very nicely with a good dollop of icecream as well.

Alternatively…

Bling

Go mad and create an tribute fit for Flora the goddess of Spring. This cake is so bright you will definitely need the shades. 

Cream Cheese Icing.

200 grms of butter (room temperature)

500 grms of cream cheese

200 grms of icing sugar (sifted)

2 tsp vanilla extract.

Make the cream cheese icing by beating the butter until it is smooth and pale. Then whisk in the other ingredients until they are all incorporated. Don’t over work or it can split. Completely cover the outside of the panatonne either in a rustic fashion similar to rendering a wall or  by carefully piping it. No prizes for guessing which method I  adopted. Normally I would not suggest adding your flowers too early to a cake (the very last minute is best) but primulas are fairly robust (look at the early Spring weather they sometimes have to deal with) so in fact I added these whilst the icing was still soft and bunged the whole lot in the fridge. They looked just as good two days later when Mandy who works for me snuck the remainder of the pud in her handbag and rustled it home.

Which do you prefer? Spring or bling!