In my experience, you either love coconut, or you hate it. In this house we are coconut lovers (if you are not, no need to read any further, it's all about the coconut from here). After searching through coconut cake recipes for Jordan's birthday yesterday, I settled on the one that seemed be the most "coconutty", a Martha Stewart recipe. And thank you Martha, Queen of All Things Baked. Yum! This recipe is moist and full of coconutty goodness (although a little warning for you crazies that don't like sugar, it is very sweet). It is so good, I am eating another piece as I type this.
This cake also looks pretty, and even though I attempted many times to screw it up, it turned out to be fairly foolproof. Lately, my baking adventures have been a bit of a disaster and this was no exception. While I was pregnant I blamed pregnancy brain, and now that Westley's born I still blame him. The poor kid gets blamed for a lot around here. So to avoid making the mistakes I did, here are a couple of tips... tip #1 is don't forget to put the coconut in the coconut cake. But the good news is that if you've got the batter perfectly mixed and poured into pans and then notice the coconut sitting lonely on the counter you can mix it back into the cake with no damage done. Tip #2 don't stress too much about the icing; you cover it all up with toasted coconut which would make anything look pretty.
Speaking of icing, I chose to make a
vegan frosting that is made with coconut oil instead of butter (truthfully because I ran out of butter and didn't have enough eggs to make the suggested frosting in the Martha recipe). This frosting is
good! And it's almost healthy - other than the 6 cups of icing sugar that is. I think this will be my new go to frosting recipe, that's how good it is.
Anyways, enough of an intro. Here's the recipe:
Martha's Coconut Cake
Martha Stewart
1 1/2 cups unsalted butter, room temp
3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for pans
1 tbsp plus 1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 cup caked, sweetened, shredded coconut
2 2/3 cups sugar
4 large whole eggs, plus 4 large egg whites
1 tbsp pure vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups unsweetened coconut milk
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter two 9 inch x 2 inch round cake pans; line bottoms with parchment rounds. Butter parchment and sides and dust with flour, tapping out excess; set aside.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt. Place shredded coconut in bowl of a food processor; pulse until finely chopped. Stir coconut into flour mixture until combined; set aside.
3. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat together butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes, scraping down the side of the bowl as needed. Add whole eggs, egg white, and vanilla; beat until fluffy and combined. With the mixer on low, add the flour mixture, alternating with the coconut milk, beginning and ending with the flour mixture, mixing well after each addition.
4. Divide batter evenly between prepared pans; smooth with an offset spatula. Bake, rotating pans halfway through, until cakes are golden brown a toothpick comes out clean, about 55 minutes.
5. Transfer pans to a wire rack to cool for 30 minutes. Invert cakes onto rack; peel off parchment paper. Reinvert cakes and let them cool completely, top sides up.
6. Using a serrated knife, trim tops of the cake layers to make level (and then quickly devour the extra bits because they are soooo tasty). Place one layer on a cake plate, and spread top with 1 and 1/2 cups frosting (recipe below). Top with remaining layer, cut side down. Using an offset spatula, spread remaining frosting over entire cake. Sprinkle cake with toasted coconut.
Coconut Frosting
Chef Chloe
2 cups coconut oil
6 cups icing sugar
2 tsp vanilla
4-10 tbsp coconut milk (or other milk)
2 cups toasted coconut (I used sweetened, but unsweetened would be good as the frosting is already sweet)
1. Beat coconut oil with mixer until smooth (this part is key, I screwed up here and added the icing sugar before the coconut oil was smooth and it was hard to get a smooth consistency).
2. Add icing sugar and vanilla.
3. Add milk 1 tbsp at a time until desired consistency is reached.
4. Beat on high for 2 more minutes until light and fluffy.
Let me know what you think if you get a chance to try it! Or come over tomorrow for a slice, because as good as it is (and even with my appetite for sweets) it is way too much for two people.
Also if you've read this far, HAPPY BIRTHDAY to that amazing guy I married almost 5 years ago, you really are the best.
XO
