I have recently discovered freeze dried fruit powders! These provide natural flavour and colour to a product as they are 100 percent fruit. I used strawberry powder in the marshmallow topping of this slice – it gave it a nice strawberry flavour and a hint of pink colour.
I buy the “Fresh As” brand from Moore Wilson in Wellington (New Zealand). “Nutrafresh” have a similar product. It is available online from http://www.cakestuff.co.nz/. (Both of these brands are possibly available from other retailers as well.)
For this marshmallow topping, I follow the true confectioners’ method which determines readiness according to temperature rather than time. This requires a food thermometer and creates a higher quality marshmallow. In case a food thermometer isn’t to hand, I have included approximate times in the recipe below.
Coconut Base
Ingredients:
- 3 eggs
- ½ cup sugar
- ¾ cup brown rice flour
- ¾ cup coconut
- 3 tablespoons cocoa
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
Method:
Line a 20 cm x 30 cm slice tin with baking paper.
Pre-heat the oven to 180ºC.
Beat together eggs and sugar.
Add flour, coconut, cocoa and baking powder. Mix to combine.
Spread the mixture into the prepared tin. It may seem at first that there isn’t enough mixture to cover the base of the tin. Use a spreader or spatula to help spread out the mixture.
Place the tin in the pre-heated oven and bake for 15 minutes.
Set aside to cool while making the marshmallow.
Marshmallow topping
Ingredients:
- 1 tablespoon gelatin
- ⅜ (¼ plus half of a quarter) cup cold water (for gelatin)
- 1 slightly heaped tablespoon honey
- 1¼ cups caster sugar
- ⅓ cup boiling water
- 1 tablespoon freeze dried fruit powder for flavour and colour
Method:
Mix together the cold water and the gelatin. Leave to swell.
In a saucepan, place the honey, caster sugar and boiling water. Heat to 122ºC/252ºF. This takes about 5 minutes. The mixture will be bubbly and will be golden in colour.
Once the mixture is at temperature, immediately remove it from the heat and transfer to the bowl of a beater. Allow the mixture to cool to 100ºC/212ºF. It doesn’t take too long for the mixture to cool to the specified temperature – about 5 minutes. If the mixture becomes too cool, it will begin to solidify and will not beat into marshmallow.
Fill with boiling water a bowl or saucepan that is slightly smaller than the bowl containing the gelatin. Place the bowl containing the swollen gelatin over the bowl or saucepan of boiling water and allow the gelatin to melt.
Add the melted gelatin to the cooled sugar mixture. Beat on high speed until the mixture is thick and stiff, similar to raw pavlova mixture. This takes about 8 minutes.
Mix in the dried fruit powder.
Spread the marshmallow over the cooled coconut base. Set aside to allow the marshmallow to set.
Cut into squares or rectangles to serve.
