Vegan, gluten-free coconut cake with vanilla cream cheese frosting.
Honestly, despite loving coconut and vanilla and cream cheese frosting, one of my new nightmares is baking coconut cakes! This one is actually coconut cake 3.0 – version one and two were some sort of catastrophic failure. Ok, version one was quite tasty, although way too flat. Version two was even flatter. Now this is version 3 – perfect! Never give up on coconut cakes ;)!!! Looks and tastes delicious:
For my version 3.0, I used xylitol and erythritol instead of sugar, so it probably does not taste as good as it would with ‘real’ sugar – which I must try as soon as I am allowed to eat sugar again (the following recipe asks for ‘normal’ sugar, but feel free to substitute). Anyway, it tastes very very delicious – despite my sugar substitutes and using a somewhat gluey mix of gluten-free all-purpose flour.
So, how can this cake be described best? It’s a really moist, fluffy, creamy combination of coconut, cream cheese and vanilla – very delicious and absolutely addictive! Please adjust this recipe according to your taste, e.g. you may add more vanilla or coconut flavour if you like. Or granish with roasted, shredded coconut. Another idea would be to spread some jam between the layers – this would surely look very nice. However, take care to use a high-quality flour for this cake and adjust the amount of milk if needed (I had some problems with my low-quality gluten-free all-purpose flour).
- 1 1/2 cup (180 g) all-purpose flour , gluten-free
- 1 cup (125 g) millet flour or another cup of all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup (50 g) tapioca starch
- 1 cup (175 g) sugar
- a pinch of salt
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 2 cups (450 ml) non-dairy milk
- 3/4 cup (150 ml) canola oil
- 1/4 cup (25 ml) apple cider vinegar
- 1 Tbsp vanilla extract
- 1 cup (75 g) coconut , shredded
- 8 ounce (225 g) cream cheese , vegan
- 1/2 cup margarine , vegan
- 1 Tbsp vanilla extract
- 2 cups (250 g) confectioner's sugar
- 1/2 cup coconut , shredded
- some shredded, eventually roasted coconut to garnish cake
- Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C) and lightly grease three 9 inch (or four 8 inch) round cake pans.
- In a large bowl, mix together dry ingredients, except shredded coconut.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together wet ingredients.
- Pour wet mixture into dry mixture and whisk until just combined.
- Gently fold in shredded coconut.
- Fill cake pans evenly with batter and bake for about 15 – 20 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean.
- Let cakes cool completely before assembling.
- Using a hand mixer, beat vegan margarine and cream cheese until smooth and creamy. Slowly add powdered sugar and vanilla and beat well until smooth. Stir in coconut.
- Spread frosting between each layer of cake. Garnish the cake with shredded coconut on top (and sides if you have frosted them).