So to start off my blog I thought I would share a great recipe for a delicious eggless coconut cake. I adapted this recipe from a Coconut Cream Polenta Cake recipe I found on the BBC Good Food website when I wanted to make a cake as surprise for my grandmother who doesn’t eat eggs. Eggless cakes can be extremely difficult to make especially for beginner bakers like myself. Without eggs it can be a struggle to get a moist texture and sometimes to even get a cake to rise. Furthermore ingredients such as egg-substitute powders and polenta aren’t exactly easy to find in most British supermarkets. My first attempt at this cake (using semolina instead of polenta) was far too dry, the second too rich and after some research and amendments to the recipe the third attempt turned out just right. See the recipe below the photograph!

http://instagram.com/p/oGf74MJVEN

Coconut Cake (Eggless)

Ingredients:

• 140g butter at room temperature
• 140g golden caster sugar
• 160 ml can of coconut cream
• 140g plain flour
• 25g desiccated coconut
• 85g fine semolina
• 2.5 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp vanilla extract (with seeds if possible)
• juice of 1 lemon

For the topping:

• 5 heaped tbsp icing sugar
• 150ml Water (Room temperature)
• Vanilla extract

Method

1. Heat the oven to 170°C/gas 3/ 325°F. Grease and line a 20cm round spring-form cake tin with baking paper.
2. Cream the butter and sugar together until fairly light and fluffy – I prefer to do all of this in a stand mixer but I’m sure an electric hand mixer would be sufficient, it might just take a little longer to get to the right texture.
3. Add the coconut cream and beat again for a minute or two.
4. Add the remaining dry cake ingredients (the order isn’t too important but I always add the semolina last).
5. Add the vanilla extract and ALL the juice of the lemon (remember to squeeze out the juice in a separate bowl and remove the seeds- you don’t want seeds in your cake mix!)
6. Beat this mixture for 3-4 minutes at a slow to medium speed, this should give you a thick slightly wet mixture
7. Spoon the ingredients into the tin and bake for 50 minutes – I usually stop and check it half way through and gently turn the cake around to ensure it cooks evenly but my oven is temperamental so this may not be necessary!
8. Once the top of the cake is golden, remove the cake and check that it is cooked throughout by inserting a skewer/long thin knife and make sure it comes out clean. If not, return it to the oven for a couple more minutes but be sure to watch it or you can risk burning the top of the cake.
9. Remove from the oven allow the cake to cool in the tin.
10. Once the cake is cool, remove it from the tin, hold it upside down with your hand spread and carefully peel away the paper on the bottom (if it was well greased it should come off easily) and transfer the cake to a plate.
11. Mix together the icing sugar and vanilla extract and slowly add room temperature water little by little until you achieve a runny, gooey, thick liquid texture – you might need more than 150ml but just make sure its runny.
12. Now this is the unusual step, but it definitely works (trust me!). Pierce holes in the cake all throughout the top with a normal dinner knife, and pour the runny icing mix all over the top of the cake, letting it drip down into the holes. Allow this to sit for a minimum of 15 minutes before serving the cake. This step add a little moisture to the cake and stops its crumbling too much when cutting and serving.
13. Dust with icing sugar (not necessary but it looks pretty!)
14. Serve with plain white ice-cream and enjoy!

By Jamie, adapted from BBC Good Food