Make no mistake: This is no ordinary confection. Perfumed with rosewater, pears and pistachios, Nigella Lawson’s gluten-free pear and pistachio rose cake from her cookbook At My Table: A Celebration of Home Cooking is tender, with fluttering floral notes. The finished product is so gorgeous, you won’t be sure whether to eat it or wear it. (We recommend devouring it.) 

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Gluten-Free Pear and Pistachio Rose Cake

Servings: One 9-inch cake (12 servings)

Time:

Ingredients:

Cake

Vegetable oil

1 cup sugar

¾ cup shelled pistachios

1 pound Bartlett pears, cored and chopped

2 cups fine almond flour

6 large eggs, at room temperature

1½ teaspoons gluten-free baking powder

1½ teaspoons rosewater

Finishing

2 teaspoons apricot preserves

½ teaspoon lemon juice

½ teaspoon rosewater

Finely chopped pistachios

Edible rose petals

Directions:

1. Make the Cake: Preheat the oven to 350°F. Grease the sides of a 9-inch springform cake pan with vegetable oil and line the base with parchment paper.

2. Add the sugar and pistachios to the bowl of a food processor and blitz until the pistachios are finely ground.

3. Add the pears, almond flour, eggs, baking powder and rosewater to the food processor and blitz until everything is smoothly combined and the pears have been puréed into the batter. Remove the blade, scrape down the mixture and use a spatula to help ease every bit of batter into the springform pan.

4. Bake until the cake is brown on top and beginning to come away from the edge of the pan, and a cake tester comes out with just a few damp crumbs sticking to it, 40 to 50 minutes. If the cake looks like it’s browning too fast, loosely cover it with aluminum foil.

5. Transfer the springform pan to a wire rack and let the cake cool completely in the pan. Like all flourless cakes, it will sink a little. Transfer the cake to a plate or cake stand.

6. Finish the Cake: Mix the preserves, lemon juice and rosewater together in a cup, then brush this glaze over the surface of the cake, removing any small blobs of apricot if there are any. Scatter the pistachios and rose petals on top of the cake.