It’s the 20th and that means it’s Cake Slice Baker’s time again. If you don’t know us, we are a group of bakers who made a cake each month from a selected cookbook. This year it as been Maida Heatter’s Cakes, but this is the last month for this book. Be sure to check back next month to see what our new cookbook will be. A hint here, it’s a beautiful book and would make an excellent gift for someone. If you’re a blogger and would like to join in, posting is always the 20th of each month. You can request to join our group on this Facebook page. If you love cakes, follow our Pinterest board to see all of the great cakes we bake!
So, on to my cake. It is a lovely little coconut cake and as I said above, pretty easy to make. There aren’t a lot of overwhelming flavors in the cake either, so the light coconut flavor comes through. I really love the extra chocolate flavor on the bottom of the cake too. I served this for a small dinner party and my guests loved it.
The recipe actually calls for a fancy tube pan, but once again, I don’t happen to have one of those, so I used my loaf pan and made two cakes. It was good because I had some left overs. Yay!
Ingredients
- 1¼ cup all-purpose flour sifted
- 1¼ cup cake flour sifted
- 1 tsp baking powder
- ¼ tsp salt
- 8 ounces unsalted butter
- 1 Tbsp vanilla extract
- 1 tsp coconut extract
- ¼ tsp almond extract
- 1 pound 3¼ cups powdered sugar
- 4 eggs
- 1 cup whipping cream
- 2 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
- 3½ ounces 1 cup shredded coconut
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°.
- Butter a 10-12 cup tube pan and dust with fine breadcrumbs.
- Sift both flours with the baking powder and salt and set aside.
- In the large bowl of an electric mixer, beat the butter to soften.
- Add the vanilla, coconut, and almond extracts and the sugar and beat to mix.
- Now, add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.
- On low speed add the sifted dry ingredients in three additions alternately with the whipping cream in two additions.
- Remove the bowl from the mixer. Transfer 1 cup of batter to a small bowl.
- Add the cocoa to the small bowl and stir well to mix.
- Next, add the coconut to the remaining batter an stir to mix.
- Place the chocolate mixture on the bottom of the pan by tablespoon full around the pan.
- Spread the chocolate over pan, spreading very lightly to not dislodge the crumbs.
- Pour the coconut mixture over the chocolate mixture and spread lightly.
- Smooth the top.
- The cake wants to rise in the middle, so use the back of a large spatula to spread the rim of the pan, making it higher around the rim and lower around the tube.
- Bake for 1 hour and about 25 minutes.
- Cover the pan with a rack, turn the pan and the rack over and remove the pan.
- Let the cake stand until it is completely cool and then for several hours before servings.
