Waverly has been very interested in my getting ready routine lately. ‘What are you doing now?’, she asked me. ‘I’m just making my eyelashes look pretty’, I answered, ‘You’re lucky, you have beautiful eyelashes’, I added. ‘I know it’, she replied honestly.
I love birthdays, especially since family members generally don’t mind letting me make them a special dinner and trying new recipes. I hadn’t made this cake before – but I’m sooo glad I did! It’s directly from Ina Garten’s, Barefoot Contessa At Home. Happy (now belated) Birthday Dorial!
Coconut Cake
3/4 lb. (1 1/2 c.) unsalted butter, softened
2 c. sugar
5 extra-large eggs at room temperature
1 1/2 t. vanilla
1 1/2 t. pure almond extract
3 c. flour
1 t. baking powder
1/2 t. baking soda
1/2 t. salt
1 c. milk
4 oz. sweetened shredded coconut
Spray two, 9-inch round cake pans, line the bottoms with parchment and spray again. Preheat the oven to 350.
Using an electric mixer with the paddle attachment, cream the butter and sugar on medium speed for about 5 minutes until fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time while mixing at medium speed making sure to scrap down the bowl as needed. Add the vanilla and almond extract and mix well. Ina Garten mentions here that the mix may look curdled – and it did – but this isn’t a problem.
In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, powder, soda and salt and with the mixer on low speed, alternately add the flour and the milk to the batter in 3 parts, starting and ending with the flour mixture. Mix until just combined and then fold in the 4 ounces of coconut by hand – I do use a kitchen scale regularly, if you don’t have one, it’s worth getting.
Pour the batter evenly into the 2 pans and smooth the tops, then bake for 45 to 55 minutes. In my oven, the cakes looked done at 45 minutes, but I left them for 50 minutes.
Cool in the pans for a half hour and then turn the cakes out onto a rack to finish cooling. I made mine the day before I was going to serve the cake and once they were completely cooled, I wrapped them well and put them in the fridge. When I was ready to ice them the next day, I trimmed one side of both cakes to make them stack more evenly and this was a lot easier to do with a cold cake – it also made it easier to frost.
Frosting
2 packages (250 g/8 oz) cream cheese, softened
1 c. unsalted butter, softened
3/4 t. vanilla
1/4 t. pure almond extract
1 lb. icing sugar
sweetened shredded coconut for decoration
Using an electric mixer with a paddle attachment, combine the cream cheese, butter, vanilla and almond extract carefully – do not whip! Add the sugar and mix just until smooth.
Place one cake on a flat serving plate and spread with frosting and then place the second layer on top. Frost the top and sides – the only trick to this is to be patient and do it slowly – and then to decorate it, sprinkle the top with the coconut and gently press some coconut into the sides as well.
This is tastiest at room temperature, just make sure it doesn’t get warm. If there’s any left over, cover it well and keep it in the refrigerator.
