Coconut Cream Cake

This cake came about as an excuse to use up lots of extra coconut cream filling. It's a double layer white cake brushed with a simple syrup, filled and topped with a light coconut cream and sprinkled with toasted coconut.

I really wanted to try out this white cake recipe because the method is different than other white cakes. You are basically cutting in the butter as you would when making a pie crust and then adding the wet ingredients- it turned out great! Moist with a nice crumb. I'll definitely be using it again the next time I need a scratch white cake.

The coconut cream isn't actually made with any coconut- it's flour frosting/filling with coconut extract added to it. Flour frosting/filling is my new favorite thing- it's absolutely amazing! You use butter/margarine/crisco (or any combination of the three) , regular white granulated sugar and paste you make out of flour and milk. It sounds weird but it makes an amazing amazing frosting or filling that is light, fluffy, not tooth achingly sweet and can even pipe well! (It pipes best if you use real butter). You can add extracts or cocoa powder to it to make any flavor you want too! No more worrying about egg whites and butter with Italian Meringue buttercream or the 2 pounds of powdered sugar needed for American buttercream! This one is hands down the best because everyone will enjoy it!

Flour frosting/filling

1/2 cup flour

1 cup milk

1 cup sugar

1 cup butter/crisco/margarine (I used half margarine and half crisco because I left my cake sitting out)

1 teaspoon vanilla (I used about 2 teaspoons of coconut extract in addition to the vanilla for this cake)

1. whisk together the flour and milk in a small saucepan. cook over low-medium heat whisking constantly so there are no lumps. it will get really thick and gloppy- thicker than glue, but thats what you want!

2. if there are lumps, you can press the mixture through a sieve. let the mixture cool to room temperature. you can do this by either sticking it in the freezer for 5-10 minutes, fridge for 20-30 minutes or let it sit on the counter. it must be room temperature though! no warm goop!

3. while your goop is cooling, beat butter/crisco/margarine together in mixer (use whisk attachment if using stand mixer) until super light and fluffy (a couple minutes).

4. add in goop. beat on high speed until the mixture becomes light, fluffy, smooth and delicious! it might look weird and curdled at one point but just keep beating. finally add in your vanilla extract, beat to combine and you're good to go!