I have so many cookbooks, I have been trying to downsize. I will occasionally go through my collection and purge ones that I don't really use or need. This past cycle, I downsized most all of my cookbooks that did not have pictures (I am a visual person) and also alot of cake cookbooks because I have too many. During another purge, I got rid of most all of my paperback ones. If I can't sell them on Craigslist or a local yard sale Facebook page, I take them into my favorite used bookstore and trade them in for store credit. Yes, I ultimately end up using this store credit for MORE cookbooks, but I have become very particular about what I buy. It has to be a fantastic cookbook. Generally, I find myself gravitating towards international cookbooks or specific special interest cookbooks. Occasionally, I will find a potential cookbook, and then after rummaging through it, see that I am only interested in one recipe. So...this happened to me yesterday and instead of buying this cookbook I took a picture of the recipe. Does it seem unethical to do this, I wonder? Maybe. But I did it nontheless (and I did end up spending all my store credit, except for $1.87, which I gave to the person in the line behind me). You can see what I ended up with at the end of this entry.
Today's recipe I am sharing is called Coconut Macaroon Cake and comes from SAVOUR: Easy Stylish Entertaining by Mark Hirchowitz, Estelle Sacharowitz and Karen Alsfine.
I could have bought the book for only $10 (it was in like new condition) at the used book store and then resold it on Amazon (it starts at $21.86 used) but I really didn't want to be bothered. What drew me to this recipe was the picture.
Oh, it looked good! Picture a pretty yellow layer of pound cake covered on top with a golden, crunchy coconut macaroon topping. It looked too good not to try. So on the way home I stopped and got the necessary ingredients and made it that very same night. Here it is!
Coconut Macaroon Cake (adapted from Savour, Random House Struik, January 12, 2012).
Bottom layer:
175 g (6.2 oz) butter, softened
3/4 c. sugar
1 1/2 cake flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
4 egg yolks (reserve the whites for the top layer)
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/2 c whole milk
Top Layer:
4 egg whites
3/4 c sugar
2 1/4 c. desiccated coconut
1. Preheat oven to 356 degrees. Grease and flour a tube pan. (I think you could also use a round cake pan at least 3" high and 8" in diameter).
2. For the bottom layer, cream the butter and sugar. I used a hand mixer for this.
3. In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder and salt.
4. Fold the dry ingredients into the butter mixture.
5. Add the egg yolks, vanilla and milk alternately.
6. Spread the mixture in the bottom of the cake pan. Note: Try note to eat the cake batter, though it is quite delicious!
7. Beat the egg whites till stiff (I used my bowl mixer for this). Gradually add the sugar. Then fold in the coconut by hand. Spread this on top of the cake batter.
8. Bake in the oven for 5 minutes, then turn the oven down to 320 degrees. Cook another 45 minutes or until the coconut is crisp. I baked it for about 38 minutes.
9. Let cool, then remove from pan (I used the old trick of placing a plate on top of the cake pan, then flipping over the cake pan, then using another plate to upright the cake).
10. Goes great with a berry coulis and/or whipped cream.
Notes:
For some reason, this book starts out with the weight of the butter in grams (the publisher is from South Africa, so this probably why). I have a scale, so it was not problem for me. But for those of you who don't, 6.2 oz butter is a little over 1 1/2 sticks of butter. Nothing else in the original recipe is in grams.
The odd temperature of 356 F is because the recipe says to pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees Celcius. I converted it to Fahrenheit and also converted the final baking temperature of 320 degrees F (the recipe calls for 160 degrees C).
I am lazy when it comes to cracking eggs, and I don't want to take a chance and mess things up so I usually use my trusty egg separator:
For the cake flour I used this:
Now, you may ask, why use cake flour and not all purpose flour? On Joy of Baking it says that cake flour has 6-8% protein and is made only from soft wheat which is also bleached versus all-purpose flour which has 10-12% protein and is made from hard and soft wheat. Cake flour is good for making cakes and cookies where a tender and delicate texture is require. If you don't have cake flour on hand and want to proceed with this recipe, you can use this recipe for making your own cake flour.
Dessicated coconut:
Desiccated coconut is coconut meat which has been shredded or flaked and then dried to remove as much moisture as possible. I used Let's Do Organic 100% Shredded Coconut Unsweetened). The recipe didn't say whether to use sweet or unsweetened, but I though using sweet would just be too much.
How much is a pinch? It's this (smile):
This is really an easy recipe. The cake is very light and airy and the contrasting crunch and chewiness of the coconut topping is really delightful. If you make a berry sauce to go with it, or perhaps drizzle some chocolate on the top it would make a very impressive dessert for family or friends. If you take this to a dinner party, I guarantee it will be a hit! And I can't see any reason why you can't have it for breakfast either (like I just did). If you love coconut macaroon cookies, you will love this cake!
Here are the cookbooks I bought with my store credit:
One last question....have you ever take any pictures of recipes in a bookstore? Is it "stealing"? Am I bad?
Today's recipe I am sharing is called Coconut Macaroon Cake and comes from SAVOUR: Easy Stylish Entertaining by Mark Hirchowitz, Estelle Sacharowitz and Karen Alsfine.
I could have bought the book for only $10 (it was in like new condition) at the used book store and then resold it on Amazon (it starts at $21.86 used) but I really didn't want to be bothered. What drew me to this recipe was the picture.
 |
| Bootleg picture. Sorry for the poor quality. |
Coconut Macaroon Cake (adapted from Savour, Random House Struik, January 12, 2012).
Bottom layer:
175 g (6.2 oz) butter, softened
3/4 c. sugar
1 1/2 cake flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
4 egg yolks (reserve the whites for the top layer)
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/2 c whole milk
Top Layer:
4 egg whites
3/4 c sugar
2 1/4 c. desiccated coconut
1. Preheat oven to 356 degrees. Grease and flour a tube pan. (I think you could also use a round cake pan at least 3" high and 8" in diameter).
2. For the bottom layer, cream the butter and sugar. I used a hand mixer for this.
3. In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder and salt.
 |
| I have a flour sifter, but find a plain old sifter works the best . |
5. Add the egg yolks, vanilla and milk alternately.
6. Spread the mixture in the bottom of the cake pan. Note: Try note to eat the cake batter, though it is quite delicious!
7. Beat the egg whites till stiff (I used my bowl mixer for this). Gradually add the sugar. Then fold in the coconut by hand. Spread this on top of the cake batter.
 |
| Beat egg whites until stiff. |
 |
| Coconut topping. |
 |
| Ready and in the oven. |
8. Bake in the oven for 5 minutes, then turn the oven down to 320 degrees. Cook another 45 minutes or until the coconut is crisp. I baked it for about 38 minutes.
9. Let cool, then remove from pan (I used the old trick of placing a plate on top of the cake pan, then flipping over the cake pan, then using another plate to upright the cake).
Notes:
For some reason, this book starts out with the weight of the butter in grams (the publisher is from South Africa, so this probably why). I have a scale, so it was not problem for me. But for those of you who don't, 6.2 oz butter is a little over 1 1/2 sticks of butter. Nothing else in the original recipe is in grams.
The odd temperature of 356 F is because the recipe says to pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees Celcius. I converted it to Fahrenheit and also converted the final baking temperature of 320 degrees F (the recipe calls for 160 degrees C).
I am lazy when it comes to cracking eggs, and I don't want to take a chance and mess things up so I usually use my trusty egg separator:
 | |||
| Foolproof method to separate eggs |
Now, you may ask, why use cake flour and not all purpose flour? On Joy of Baking it says that cake flour has 6-8% protein and is made only from soft wheat which is also bleached versus all-purpose flour which has 10-12% protein and is made from hard and soft wheat. Cake flour is good for making cakes and cookies where a tender and delicate texture is require. If you don't have cake flour on hand and want to proceed with this recipe, you can use this recipe for making your own cake flour.
Dessicated coconut:
Desiccated coconut is coconut meat which has been shredded or flaked and then dried to remove as much moisture as possible. I used Let's Do Organic 100% Shredded Coconut Unsweetened). The recipe didn't say whether to use sweet or unsweetened, but I though using sweet would just be too much.
How much is a pinch? It's this (smile):
This is really an easy recipe. The cake is very light and airy and the contrasting crunch and chewiness of the coconut topping is really delightful. If you make a berry sauce to go with it, or perhaps drizzle some chocolate on the top it would make a very impressive dessert for family or friends. If you take this to a dinner party, I guarantee it will be a hit! And I can't see any reason why you can't have it for breakfast either (like I just did). If you love coconut macaroon cookies, you will love this cake!
Here are the cookbooks I bought with my store credit:
 |
| Should be named "Macarons" not "Macaroons". I cannot have too many macaron cookbooks (my 6th). |
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| You can never have too many doughnut cookbooks either! |
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| I am a sucker for holiday cookbooks. This is from the French chefs of La Madeline Restaurant. |
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| I don't have any cookbooks on cheese making , now I do. Subject of next blog? |
