Carambola (Star Fruit) Upside Down Cake

Carambola (Star Fruit) Fruit

This is a paraphrased variation of the Mango Upside Down Cake from Linda Woodrow's amazingly useful and relevant Witches Kitchen blog which made use of a Mango seasonal glut. In the Bellinger Valley we are now entering a carambola (star fruit) glut. We find the carambola perfectly replaces the mangoes texture and taste.

The Recipe:

Turn your oven on to heat up to medium (180°C or 350°F).


Grease a 20 cm cake tin and line the base with a circle of greaseproof paper.

Make the carambola topping first.

Slice enough ripe carambolas to nearly cover the bottom of the cake pan in a single layer.  Arrange them in a decorative circle if you like. Sprinkle half a cup of chopped macadamia nuts (or use other nuts) in the gaps.

In a frypan, melt a good dessertspoon of butter and a good dessertspoon of raw sugar. Cook for a few minutes till the butter sugar mix just starts to caramelise and go sticky, then drizzle this mix over the carambolas and nuts.

Cake batter.

In a food processor, blend together 100 gm butter (just under half a cup, or most of a stick) with half a cup of  brown sugar.

When it is nice and fluffy, add three eggs, one by one, and half a cup of chopped carambola.

Then a teaspoon of vanilla, or scrape half a pod, and a cup of self-raising flour.

Pour this over the carambola topping.

Bake for around 40 minutes in a medium oven till a straw comes out clean.

Cool for ten minutes or so in the pan, then carefully turn out. Run a knife around the edge of the cake in the pan, put a plate over the top, then invert and tap lightly on the bottom of the pan.  Carefully peel off the paper."