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Deep-Fried Delicious Memories

1 Nov

Two days after what was probably the most fun wedding party ever, my in-laws hosted brunch for our family at the Grand Concourse. My mother-in-law Lynn was glowing with pride in a beautiful floral print pink dress and matching cardigan as she welcomed everyone to another celebration as a big, new family.

The Grand Concourse lives up to its name in more ways than one. It’s a giant restaurant set in an old train station, and is famous for its vast brunch buffet complete with everything from roast beef to bananas foster. But what was it that tickled our family the most?

The doughnut machine.

Yes, the doughnut machine. A mold dropped perfectly shaped pieces of doughnut batter into oil just long enough for them to cook and then moved them  along to a conveyor belt where the grease drained off of them. Next to the machine were two bowls where the doughnut could be dipped in either powdered sugar or cinnamon sugar. Needless to say, we were all incredibly entertained by this. Especially Joe and Lynn.

For almost as long as I’ve known Joe, I’ve known exactly where he gets his eating habits. It’s certainly not my father-in-law, who like me, thinks vegetables really are a food group. Nope, it’s definitely his mom. Their shared love for burgers and fries, anything with blueberries in it, and fresh, hot doughnuts is unmatched. We arrived in Louisville late one night on a flight from DC and saw that the Krispy Kreme nearby had the “hot doughnuts” sign lit up. I blinked and we were at the drive-thru window. On another occasion when I’d had just about enough of grad school, I closed the books for a day and made yeast doughnuts with a honey glaze and sent half of them with Joe when he went to visit his parents. I was later asked why only a half-dozen had been delivered.

It was a long summer for Lynn as she fought valiantly to stay well amidst all of her treatments and enjoy the wedding festivities. By the time the brunch in Pittsburgh came around, she didn’t have much in the way of an appetite anymore. But when my brother returned to our table with two fresh mini-doughnuts for her (one of each kind, of course!), she took a bite of each. It was the first thing I’d seen her eat in a long time and one of the few foods she said still tasted good to her. Had I the time, I’d have been churning out doughnut recipes for all of August.

Things changed very quickly when we returned from Pittsburgh. A few posts ago in “Bake it All Away,” I mentioned that the reason I’d baked bread that particular day was because I was feeling sad and powerless. It was right around that time that Lynn’s condition started to deteriorate. All I could do was make frozen meals for my father-in-law, sit by Lynn’s bedside singing and trying to remember the words to songs from “Evita” (her favorite musical), and play Rachmaninoff recordings so at least she might dream about being at spectacular performances at the Kennedy Center.

On October 23rd, Lynn’s long battle with ovarian cancer ended. She passed away peacefully with Joe, Roger, myself, her sisters, and her nurse at her side. The loss has felt agonizingly painful at times and we’ve all spent the last week in kind of a fog. Life still doesn’t feel real, and I imagine that it will take a long time to get used to the “new normal.”

Then Hurricane Sandy hit and gave us Monday and Tuesday off of work this week. It was kind of a relief and gave me time to do something a little bit fun and lighthearted for a little bit of distraction.

I’ve been promising Joe for a month that I’d make cider doughnuts for him. But we spent most of our October days being where we truly needed to be, with our family. So when I suddenly had unexpected free time on Tuesday morning, I decided to spend it elbow deep in flour and all the spicy sweet smells of autumn.

Cider doughnuts are cake doughnuts, so there’s no rise time involved here. That said, the dough does require some chilling prior to cutting, so make sure you have a good chunk of time on hand before starting.

Apple Cider Doughnuts

  • 1 cup apple cider (fresh, unfiltered is best)
  • 2 small strips of orange peel
  • 1 shot bourbon
  • 3 ½ cups flour
  • 2/3 cup sugar
  • 1/3 cup brown sugar
  • 2 tsp. baking powder
  • 1 tsp. baking soda
  • 2 tsp. cinnamon
  • ½ tsp. fresh grated nutmeg
  • ½ tsp. salt
  • ½ cup buttermilk
  • 2 eggs, room temperature
  • 4 tbsp. unsalted butter, softened

Toppings

  • Sugar mixed with cinnamon
  • Powdered sugar mixed with just enough cider to achieve a glaze that ribbons off of a spoon.

Combine the apple cider, orange peel, and bourbon in a small pot over medium heat and simmer until it reduces to between a 1/3 and ¼ of a cup of liquid. Discard the orange peel and set the liquid aside to cool.

In a large bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the sugar and butter together until smooth. With the speed turned to low, add the eggs one at a time, mixing in between additions, and then add the cider reduction and milk. Mix until well blended.

Add the flour mixture to the wet ingredients and mix just until everything comes together. You’ll have a sticky, loose dough.

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and dust it with flour. Scrape the dough out of the bowl and onto the baking sheet and flatten it with your hands until it is ½ in. thick. Freeze for 20 minutes or until slightly firm.

Cut doughnuts into desired shapes and place them on a second baking sheet lined with floured parchment paper. I used a 2 in. biscuit cutter and got 3 dozen small doughnuts. A larger biscuit cutter can also be used, in which case you should also cut out the middles (a shot glass dipped in flour works well) and use them to make doughnut holes. If a 1 in. cutter is used to make only doughnut holes, the yield is about 10 dozen. These fry fairly quickly and it’s easier to avoid raw middles with smaller doughnuts.

Refrigerate the pan of doughnuts while you prepare the frying oil and toppings. Put each topping in a shallow bowl and set them next to a wire rack placed over a piece of aluminum foil. Fill a pot with at least three inches of peanut or corn oil. They both have high smoke points, but peanut oil is my favorite for frying. Heat the oil over a burner set to medium-high until it reaches 350-360 degrees. Keep the oil within that temperature range while you fry the doughnuts and you won’t end up with greasy pastries. If you filter your oil at the end to reuse it, you’ll notice that you lose very little when you pay attention to temperature control.

Fry batches of 5-6 doughnuts at a time for 30-60 seconds on each side or until brown. Two chopsticks or butter knives make it easy to flip them. One batch I made had a few that were a little doughy in the middle, so I’d lean toward the longer cooking time for larger doughnuts. Doughnut holes cook much faster, so watch them closely. Check the oil temperature between each batch and adjust the heat accordingly.

Drain the doughnuts on paper towels for a few seconds and then either dip in the glaze or roll in the sugar. Enjoy warm with a cup of very strong coffee for maximum joy.

As Joe and I ate them and relaxed on a much-needed surprise day off of work, I couldn’t help but smile and think of Lynn. She’d have been right there with Joe, probably play-fighting for the last one on the plate.

If you want to see some of Lynn’s favorites, check out other recipes I’ve made for her: There’s Easter Bread (she loved it for grilled cheese sandwiches), Flourless Chocolate Cake with Italian Meringue for the chocoholics, and last year’s special birthday treat, a Coconut Layer Cake for the true southerners out there.

I’ll always love this special lady for everything she was: A generous, loving, kind, intelligent and empowered woman with more wit in her little finger than I have in my entire body. I feel blessed to have known her, and even more special to be a part of her family forever.

Ciao for now,

Neen

Tribute to the Pie Queen

9 Oct

My best friend at Northeastern U. was an incredible baker. You’d walk into her dormitory suite and be enveloped in the warm scent of apples, cinnamon, and buttery pastry. She was undoubtedly one of the most generous people I have ever met in my life, and never once hesitated to take care of those around her. My freshman year of college, I would be her kitchen helper when she made dinner for our friends once a week. Every week was a different theme; from Italian and Southern favorites to a night of American classics that ended in an epic powdered sugar fight. Outside of my family, she is the one person who truly inspired me to see cooking in that light. She’s one of the reasons I almost never bake anything without intending to give some of it away.

Eight years ago today I solo-baked my first layer cake and it was for her. My decorating skills were even less, um, elegant than they are now and I used M&Ms to spell out her name on top of the icing. We watched a Red Sox v. Yankees playoff game, drank, ate, and laughed our heads off with the rest of our friends the entire evening. That night is more vivid in my mind than almost any other from that year living on Columbus Avenue. I adored those friends, especially the skinny guy with the sandy blonde curls and bright yellow “Firefighters for Kerry” shirt who asked me out four days later. Who knew I’d be calling him my husband someday?

Every year when that first autumn chill hits my bones, I think of my friend and the incredible apple pie she would make for us at a moment’s notice. That inaugural Fall day was most certainly yesterday. Saturday was warm with puffy clouds in the sky and then BAM: 50 degrees and overcast on Sunday.

I only had two apples in the refrigerator. Damn. Pie was not to be, but all was not lost. A lonely package of thawed phyllo dough called out to me and the next thing I knew I was making origami folds with the paper thin sheets slicked with butter. It might not be pie, but the little pockets of goodness were certainly easy to transport and share with colleagues.

I think she’d be proud of me.

Apple Turnovers with Hazelnuts and Almonds

Okay, take a deep breath. You are going to tear several sheets of phyllo dough. Don’t worry about it. Either patch it with a dab of butter or just grab a fresh sheet from the box. To keep your phyllo pliable while you work with it, keep what you aren’t currently working with and covered with a damp towel.

  • 2 large apples. I used Rome apples this time and enjoyed them a lot.
  • 1/3 cup sugar, plus extra for dusting finished pastry.
  • 3 tbsp. all-purpose flour
  • 1 tsp. ground cinnamon
  • 20 sheets phyllo dough (14 inches x 9 inches), thawed, unrolled and covered with a damp cloth.
  • 6 tablespoons butter, melted
  • ½ cup chopped toasted hazelnuts and almonds

Preheat an oven to 375 degrees F.

Core, peel, and chop the apples. This kitchen toy is pretty awesome. I keep it around for when I make apple rings to dry or preserve. A $10 investment that will save you a massive amount of time unless you are Hiroyuki Sakai: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-xkL9DbwJc

Combine the apples, sugar, cinnamon, flour, and chopped nuts (if using) and set aside.

Now you are going to assemble and fold the dough exactly as you would do with the American flag. Here is a very clear video of the folding process. You don’t need to do the final fold at the edge and can finish with your original triangle pattern: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PcOWc5EJbVo

Place one sheet of phyllo dough on a clean work surface and brush one half with butter. Fold the sheet in half lengthwise and then repeat the process of buttering and folding. You’ll have a long strip of dough.

Take about one tablespoon of the apple filling and put it at one end of the phyllo strip. Then, fold the edge over the filling at a 90 degree angle to form a triangle shape. Continue folding into triangles the whole way down the strip of dough. Place the finished turnover seam side down on a baking sheet.

Repeat the process until you run out of either dough or filling. If you are being really neat and meticulous about it, you could probably get two dozen turnovers out of this recipe.

Brush the finished turnovers with melted butter, sprinkle on some extra cinnamon and sugar, and then bake for 15 minutes or until golden brown at the edges and on the bottom. Move them to a cooling rack. Unlike pie, you can eat them right away without the fear of oozing pie goo being left in the pan and not on your plate.

So, an autumn tribute to the Pie Queen, who taught me that generosity is the greatest gift in the world and always made me feel that no matter how cold the Boston winters were, there would always be a place to go to be warm all over. Thank you, my friend.

Ciao for now,

Neen

Bake It All Away: Honey Wheat Oatmeal Bread

5 Sep

Have you ever had one of those days when you’re just mad at the world?

I had such a day earlier this week. In this case, it was over a situation which has left me feeling small, sad, and powerless. I can only stand by and watch things unfold. There is almost nothing I can do to improve or fix any of it.

And so I found myself riding my bike along the Potomac River , barely paying much attention to anything except the occasional mile marker. When I finally stopped at Theodore Roosevelt Island, I paused just for a minute. My mind started to wander and I immediately began pedaling again. The last thing I wanted to do was think.

The trails between my house and Roosevelt Island aren’t particularly difficult. There are a few grades that challenge the relatively small tires on my fold-up commuter bike, but I didn’t huff and puff the way I used to and was finally at the point where I felt mostly balanced and less terrified. But riding still required a bizarre kind of blank focus. I didn’t think about anything else, and was just aware of the road hazards, people, and sounds around me. It was only once my bike was back in the trunk of my car that I thought “Okay, time to pick up groceries and get a latte for Joe.” For those fifteen miles though, I felt a kind of ignorant freedom.

It was what I needed. I’m not saying that trumpets sounded and I was walking around with my chest puffed up and head held high, but I felt determined rather than just mad, and decided that I could do something both distracting and productive. I’d do what I almost always do when confronted with extreme stress:

Bake bread.

My father-in-law was diagnosed with diabetes not too long ago and has been trying to improve his (already very healthy) diet. He’s cut most refined carbohydrates out and has replaced his regular dark chocolate bars with ones sweetened with stevia. So I thought it would be nice to bring him a fresh baked loaf of something hearty and soft, equally delicious for both sandwiches and toast. This recipe makes just that. Low in fat and sugar (1.5 g of each per slice), but rich in fiber and protein, it’s a pretty darn good loaf of bread. It’s also a good way to start your kids on wheat bread, because the honey gives it just enough sweetness to be enticing.

You might be able to make this using only whole wheat flour, but you’d probably need to use some whole wheat pastry flour so it’s light enough to get a proper rise. I’d also recommend buckwheat honey; you can even replace a few tablespoons of it with blackstrap molasses for extra iron.

Honey Wheat Oatmeal Bread

  • 3 1/2 cups whole wheat flour, plus extra for flouring kneading surfaces and hands
  • 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 cup rolled oats
  • 1/4 cup multi-grain hot cereal (I used Bob’s Red Mill wheat-free)
  • 1 tbsp. salt
  • 2 tbsp. active dry yeast
  • 2 cups water, divided
  • 1/2 cup whole milk
  • 1/3 cup raw, dark honey
  • 1/4 cup butter, melted and cooled to room temperature

Heat the milk and 1 1/2 cups of the water in a large saucepan until steaming, but not boiling. Remove from the heat and stir in the oatmeal. Let cool, stirring occasionally, until just warm to the touch. The oats will soak up a lot of the milk, but the mixture will still be fairly loose.

Heat the remaining 1/2 cup of water to 100-110 degrees F. In large bowl, combine the yeast, 1 tsp. of honey, and the warm water. Set aside until very foamy.

In another bowl, stir together the flours, hot cereal, and salt.

Add the yeast mixture, butter, and remaining honey to the oatmeal mixture and stir to combine.

Add the oatmeal mixture and stir until a soft dough forms. It will be very sticky. If it’s too loose to knead, add up to ¾ cup of flour a few tablespoons at a time.

Turn the dough out on to a floured board. Flour your hands and knead for 10 minutes or until smooth and elastic. The dough will be slightly sticky.

Oil a large bowl, roll the dough into a ball and put it in the bowl. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and allow it to rise in a warm place until doubled in size (about 1 1/2 hours).
Punch down the dough and divide it in half. Roll each portion out into a 8 x 13 in. rectangle.

Roll the dough up jelly-roll style and tuck the edges under to shape the loaf. Place each in a greased 8 1/2 x 4 in. loaf pan. Cover the pans with a tea towel and allow the dough to rise again for 1 to 1 1/2 hours or until doubled in size.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Brush the tops of the loaves with an egg wash and sprinkle on extra rolled oats.

Bake the bread for 35-40 minutes or until the internal temperature reaches 190 degrees.

Remove loaves from pans and cool completely on a wire rack.

Yield: 2 loaves (Sixteen 1.5 oz. slices per loaf)

A doctor I knew once told me that while when we can’t change the situation, we must learn to change how we react and relate to it. Rather than lash out at those around me, growl at the guy that cut me off in traffic, eat an entire pan of crispy rice squares, or glare at the woman taking her sweet time at the grocery store checkout, I did something kind for myself and my family.  I gave myself and my father-in-law something healthy to nourish us physically, and simultaneously soothed myself emotionally.

Should you ever wake up one day angry and frustrated by the world around you, admit to yourself, “Yep, this sucks.” If there’s nothing you can do to change the situation and you feel completely stuck, remember what you learned in preschool and share something good with another person (or people). Helping someone else might be just what makes you remember that the world can be nice.

So go bake some bread, and give a gift to yourself and a friend. I pinky-swear promise that you’ll be glad you did.

Ciao for now,

Neen

Easter Bread 101

26 Apr

I consider myself a bread connoisseur. Outside of really good cioppino or bouillabaisse, fresh bread is my favorite thing to eat. When I think about the fact that people have made this one food for centuries, I realize that I cannot possibly be the only one that feels this way.

One of my most beloved varieties is one that only pops up in the spring. It’s lightly sweet and a little bit rich, and for one reason or another only gets made at Easter (oh cruel fate). But you should totally rage against the machine and make it all year.

For most of my life, I’ve almost always seen this bread made with either vegetable shortening or oil, so when Bon Appetit featured an all-butter recipe in one of their recent issues I was very keen to try it. While it was an excellent recipe, I thought that their methodology lacked some important details, and that there were a few ingredients I’d tweak. When I baked up a loaf for our Easter Sunday picnic with the future in-laws, I took some pictures and thought I’d share the experience.

Easter Bread

Adapted from grandma, dad, mom, Bon Appetit…etc.

  • 2/3 cup whole milk
  • 5 tbsp. sugar, divided
  • ¼ oz. envelope of dry active yeast
  • 2 large eggs, room temperature
  • 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour (plus extra for handling dough)
  • 1 tsp. salt
  • 1-2 tsp. grated orange zest
  • 4 oz. unsalted butter
  • Egg wash: One whole egg mixed with 1 tbsp. water

First of all, get out the eggs and butter and let them get to room temperature. It’s really important for your butter to be soft, so don’t skip this step.

Heat the milk until it reaches about 110 degrees F and then put it in a small bowl and whisk in 1 tbsp. of sugar and the yeast. Let the mixture sit for 5-10 minutes or until foamy. Add the eggs and orange zest, and whisk thoroughly.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine the flour, salt, and remaining sugar. With the mixer running on low speed, add the milk mixture. Once it has been thoroughly integrated into the flour, begin adding the butter about 1 tbsp. at a time, blending well between each addition. Slow and steady wins the race here. It’s kind of like making buttercream.

Once all of the butter has been incorporated, fit the mixer with a dough hook and mix on medium-high speed until the dough is very smooth and elastic.

Now, here’s the part where people seem to panic. This dough is sticky, and I mean “I can’t get my hand out of this blob of dough” sticky:

But you have to get the dough out of the mixing bowl and into a clean bowl brushed with melted butter somehow, and the best tool for the job is a bowl scraper. If you don’t have one, a rigid silicone spatula or greased spoon works well. Once you’ve transferred it to a clean, greased bowl, gently brush the top of the dough with melted butter, cover the bowl loosely in plastic wrap, and stash it in the refrigerator.

Letting this dough do an overnight “rise” in the refrigerator makes it infinitely easier to handle, so I highly recommend that. I have the word rise in quotation marks because honestly, the dough doesn’t rise very much at all. In fact the first time I made it I thought something had gone horribly wrong.

The next step is to lightly flour a surface and cut the dough into three equal pieces. Use as little excess flour as possible. You want just enough to keep it from sticking to the surface.

Roll each piece into a long (15-16in) rope and taper at the edges. Place the dough ropes on a piece of parchment paper, pinch them together at one end, and then braid. (Many Easter Bread bakers tuck dyed, boiled eggs in between the braids, but I didn’t make any this year.)

At the end of the braid, pinch the ends together and tuck them under slightly to secure. Let the loaf rest in a warm place for one hour. It will puff a little bit, but not too much.

Preheat an oven to 375 degrees F.

Brush the loaf of bread with the egg wash and bake it for 23-25 minutes, until the top is a deep golden brown. The internal temperature will measure about 190 degrees.

Eat every day until it’s gone. Future mom-in-law said she used a few slices for grilled cheese the next day and it was really good. I’m a big fan of Easter bread toast and runny fried eggs. Or you could try using it in this supremely tasty recipe for French toast.

Hope you are all having a beautiful spring. Who else is getting really impatient for summer fruit? Come on berries, get growing already!

Ciao for now,

Neen

Strawberry-Lemon Macarons

22 Jan

Oh hi, I didn’t see you there…Happy New Year!

I was a busy holiday season. Lots of candy, cookies, and granola were made and many smiles were shared with family and friends.

Neen’s Notes is finally back after a whirlwind few months, and I’ve brought you something truly delightful and delicate: The Macaron! And what an awesome little cookie it is. Finely ground almonds and powdered sugar mixed into well-beaten egg whites to form an incredibly delicious meringue. When baked correctly, they come out with crisp outsides and chewy middles. The best part is figuring out what to sandwich between them. Yum.

There are many methods for making macarons floating around. I found this to be the one that worked best given the time frame I had and the equipment and relatively small space of my kitchen at home.

Shall we get our French cookie-baking on? I think we shall…

Strawberry-Lemon Macarons

Ingredients for the cookies:

  • 5 oz. sliced almonds (blanched will give you a more polished look)
  • 8 oz. powdered sugar
  • 5 oz. egg whites
  • 2.5 oz. granulated sugar
  • 1 tsp. vanilla extract
  • Pinch of salt
  • Zest of one lemon
  • Red food coloring (optional)

Ingredients for the strawberry-lemon filling:

  • 4 oz. butter, softened
  • 3 cups powdered sugar
  • 4-5 strawberries
  • 1-2 tbsp. cream
  • Zest of one lemon
  • Pinch of salt

First, get your workspace ready. Fit a piping bag with a plain ½ inch tip (or just cut the corner off of a plastic bag) and line 4 baking sheets with parchment paper.

In the bowl of a food processor, grind the almonds until fine and then grind with the powdered sugar and lemon zest until a sandy texture is reached.

Mix the food coloring into the granulated sugar and set aside (the color doesn’t need to be perfectly distributed). I went very easy on the food coloring, so my cookies looked almost salmon-colored when piped, but gel food colorings brighten as they set so I always err on the light side. You’ll see that the finished product is very pink.

Put the egg whites and salt in the bowl of a stand mixer and whip them on medium speed until foamy. Increase the speed and slowly add the granulated sugar. Beat until stiff peaks form.

Add the almond mixture and vanilla extract to the meringue and start folding and mixing it in. I do this by hand because it is much easier to feel when it smooths out. You don’t want to overbeat it, but you want a nice texture that ribbons when you lift the spatula out of the bowl.

Transfer the batter to the piping bag and pipe small 1.5 in. circles about 1 inch apart on the baking sheets. Tap the baking sheets on the counter to get rid of any air bubbles in the batter. Leave the baking sheets of cookies at room temperature for about a half hour or until the tops appear somewhat dry.

Preheat the oven to 300 degrees F. Bake the cookies for 16-20 minutes, or until they are puffed up, feel dry, and peel away from the parchment paper easily. Rotate the pans once in the middle of cooking. Cool on a wire rack.

While the cookies are cooling, prepare the strawberry-lemon filling.

In the bowl of a food processor, puree the strawberries and then add the butter and 2 cups of powdered sugar and process until well combined. Add a pinch of salt, the cream, and powdered sugar until a creamy texture is reached. Again, cut the corner off of a plastic bag and transfer the icing to it.

Pipe small circles onto the flat side of one meringue and sandwich another cookie on top, pressing lightly to spread the filling to the edge. Be gentle, as you’ll see from my final photos, the cookies are delicate and crack easily.

I brushed these ones with a little bit of luster dust to make them shiny.


Store the cookies covered in the refrigerator for up to a week. These were sent off to Joe’s office as a Friday treat for him and his colleagues.

Looking forward to sharing all sorts of recipes with you in the new year. Let’s make 2012 the most delicious one yet!

Ciao for now,

Neen

Coconut Cake for Lynn

16 Nov

Over the summer, I discovered my future mother-in-law’s love for coconut cake. Her only complaint was that half the time you order it somewhere, it turns out to be a plain white cake covered with tooth-achingly sweet seven-minute frosting and bland shredded coconut. The coconut flavor just isn’t there. Right then, I knew exactly what I’d make for her birthday this year.

Many coconut cake devotees insist that the only way to achieve real coconut taste is to use a fresh one, but I couldn’t find one anywhere in Northern Virginia. I’d even charged the power drill, but it wasn’t to be. After some research I discovered other ways of injecting some true coconut flavor into the cake, and I have to say that I think it turned out even better because of how the ingredients created a soft, tender cake and rich icing with just the right amount of sweetness. It was a big hit among the family and I think honestly, one of the best cakes I’ve ever made.

Coconut Layer Cake for Lynn

For the cake:

  • 2 1/4 cups cake flour, sifted
  • 2 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 2/3 cups sugar
  • 1/3 cup butter, softened
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 (14-ounce) can light coconut milk
  • 1/2 tablespoon vanilla extract
  • 1/2 tablespoon coconut extract

Frosting and decoration:

  • 16 oz.cream cheese
  • 4 oz.butter, softened
  • 2 cups powdered sugar
  • 1/2 cup cream of coconut
  • 2 cups shredded coconut, half sweetened, half unsweetened, toasted until golden in a 350 degree F oven for 3-5 minutes.

Preheat oven to 350°.

Coat 2 (9-inch) round cake pans with butter and dust with flour.

Whisk together 2 1/4 cups sifted flour, baking powder, and salt, and set aside.

Place sugar and butter in a large bowl; cream at medium speed until well blended (about 5 minutes). Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Add flour mixture and coconut milk alternately to the wet ingredients, beginning and ending with flour mixture. Stir in extracts.

Pour batter into prepared pans. Sharply tap the pans once on countertop to remove air bubbles. Bake at 350° for 30 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in pans 10 minutes on wire racks, and then remove from pans. Cool completely on wire rack.

Wrap cooled cakes tightly in plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight.

Prepare the icing by beating the cream cheese and softened butter together on medium speed until fluffy and smooth. Then, switch to a whisk and slowly add the powdered sugar and cream of coconut and whisk until smooth. Cover the bowl of icing and refrigerate until use.

To assemble the cake, unwrap one layer and cover it with a layer of frosting. Add the next layer and frost the entire cake lightly and return it to the refrigerator. Once the icing has set up slightly, apply a final, smooth coat of icing and finish with the toasted, shredded coconut.

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