Ulu Chocolate Cake: Recipe Experiment

Painting in background and ulu cake by Shastin

Living here in Hawai‘i, we find some very interesting fruits. Breadfruit or ulu, as it is also known, is a very unique one indeed. You can usually find the round green ulu at the local farmers market. Recipes most often call for a hard, young breadfruit but for my recipe here we will need one that is ripe and soft.

This recipe came out of a happy accident and some experimentation. I had originally planned to use a green ulu a try out another recipe, but I waited too long and it got soft. Frugal girl that I am, I refused to waste it so I cut it open and tasted the soft flesh. I noticed it was naturally sweet but a little bitter. I then just went with my adventurous spirit and began to add some fresh ripe apple bananas, honey, carob and cacao powders and other stuff. I noticed that the batter was very elastic and almost cake-like so I decided to throw it in the oven to see what would come of it.

The recipe was a success and produced a very moist, gluten-free, egg-free chocolate cake which I brought to a beach party where is was promptly devoured! That's when I realized I had something worth writing down so I made several more attempts to recreate and record the recipe with exact measurements. Here is the final version for you to try out at home. As always, I recommend buying all your ingredients organic and local. Much aloha, enjoy!

Ulu Chocolate Cake
Serves 20-30
1 small – medium ulu, ripe and soft
4 ripe apple bananas
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 tablespoon molasses
1/2 cup raw honey
1 tablespoon virgin, unrefined coconut oil
1/2 cup raw cacao powder
1 1/2 cups raw carob powder
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 tablespoon pumpkin pie spice (cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger)

Preheat oven to 340 degrees fahrenheit. In large bowl, mash up breadfruit, bananas, honey, molasses, vanilla and coconut oil. Mix until well blended. In separate bowl, mix cacao, carob, salt, baking soda and spices. Add dry mixture to wet and stir together until well blended. Grease an 8"x8" glass pan with coconut oil and "flour" it with a little carob powder. Dump ingredients into pan and bake for about an hour. Allow to cool. Serve and enjoy ;-)