Everyday Food Coconut Shrimp Soup (with added curry)

Coconut (and Curry) Shrimp Soup

Hi everyone,
I'm in the DC area this week helping my preggers friend Racheal who is on bed rest. We just finished watching 6 hours of Colin Firth in Pride & Prejudice - I can't believe my English major friend never saw it! Glad we can mark that movie off her list of the best RoCo movies of all time!

Anyway, I figure my friend can't eat dessert all day so I brought the book Everyday Food: Great Food Fast, and let Racheal bookmark some pages. First up, Coconut Shrimp Soup!

This was very simple to put together...once I figured out which way to cut the carrots! :)

Garlic and ginger are cooked, then the carrots, coconut milk, water, and cornstarch are added. You'll need to serve this immediately because the cornstarch and pasta soak up all the liquid if you let it sit...believe me on that!

I made the recipe exactly and when I tasted it, it had way too much coconut flavor. Way. too. much.

I added lots of curry powder and more red pepper flakes. And, we added in our left over Thai yellow curry from the previous day's take out! In addition, I squeezed a bunch of lime juice on top. I served it with Sriracha sauce (a staple in any house!) I probably won't make this recipe again, but at least I didn't let my friend starve! :)

Recipe: Coconut Shrimp Soup (I added lots of curry powder)

Later, I made a roast chicken, and apple & cherry crisp...coming up soon!

Coconut Butter Thins (Tuesdays with Dorie)

Coconut Butter Thins

For this week's Tuesdays with Dorie selection, Jayne of The Barefoot Kitchen Witch selected on Coconut Butter Thins on page 145 of Dorie's book, Baking: From My Home to Yours.

This recipe calls for lime zest but I forgot to buy one and used a Meyer lemon instead. The dough was easy to put together in the morning, roll out and let it chill out in the refrig. I came home from work, cut them out and baked them off. Dorie has you cut them into squares with a ruler and all...but my blob of dough was so misshaped I thought circles might be easier!

They were light and buttery. Coconut, lemon zest, & macadamia nuts!
Be sure to check out the other Tuesdays with Dorie bakers!

P.S. Happy Birthday Dad!

Coconut Layer Cake (Everyday Food)

Coconut Layer Cake with Lemon Curd Filling

As I mentioned in this early post, I want to make the four cakes from "The Best Cakes" episode of Everyday Baking. I made the Spiced Carrot Cake in February, and here is cake #2: Coconut Layer Cake.

Coconut Layer Cake recipe on the Everyday Food website and on Martha Stewart's website.

This recipe has two layers of basic vanilla cake, seven minute frosting and a frosting/lemon curd filling. It said to use store bought lemon curd and although I have a basket full of Meyer Lemons, I felt like picking up this jar at Trader Joe's (it is way good and only $2.99).

I just love the Seven Minute Frosting - egg whites, sugar, corn syrup, cream of tartar can turn into magic frosting! This is the second time I made it...and both times missed the part about beating it off the heat (after beating it over a double boiler for 7 minutes) for another 3-5 minutes to cool it down. I just slathered on hot frosting...oops. I also like bringing out the old school plug in mixer! I think there is a 30 year old patina on it!

The lemon curd/frosting filling is covered with coconut. I'm not a fan of shredded coconut so I tend to scrape that part off! :)

Recently, I made the Southern Coconut Cake from Sky-High Cakes. I think a combo of these two cakes would be perfect. Sky-High has a great cake - it is made with cake flour and coconut milk...it is soft and delicious. I do like the addition of lemon curd in this one and the frosting was light. I messed up the Sky-High frosting so I threw on a cream cheese frosting. I think either the seven-minute or cream cheese frosting would be good...and, of course, without those pesky coconut strands (but I think some would balk at that! :)

Coconut Layer Cake

Recipe for Coconut Layer Cake

Southern Coconut Cake (Cake Slice Bakers)

Southern Coconut Cake

For this month's, Cake Slice Bakers, we voted to make Southern Coconut Cake from Alisa Huntsman's book: Sky-High Cakes: Irresistible Triple-Layer Cakes. (Luckily, I made it early before my oven started giving me troubles.)

I must tell you something. I'm not a fan of flaked coconut. I do enjoy coconut milk in Thai food curries and the "makes me weak in the knees" mango with sticky rice. But I can't stand the texture of flaked coconut. Seriously, there is very little difference between coconut and dental floss.

And that's why I love my job. It's interesting, challenging, and there is a group of people who like coconut!! :)

I loved the cake. The cake has a lovely crumb and uses coconut milk for a delicious (sans dental floss) coconut yumminess. Okay, I had to make this cake twice. The first time, I completely missed the sugar! What?! How did that happen? Well, this recipe uses the fat-flour method and mixes the dry ingredients with the butter before adding in the wet ingredients. If it started with creaming the butter and sugar, I wouldn't have forgotten the sugar (at least I hope so! :) Oh, well, it was sorta funny when it happened!

I made the frosting twice too! The original recipe calls for an Italian meringue technique (adding hot sugar syrup to egg whites), but I tried the Swiss meringue technique (heating the sugar and egg whites over a double-boiler) since I'm more familiar with it and I can get the egg whites up to 160 degrees. But adding the cream cheese/butter mixture didn't go as planned and I ended up with soup (the meringue was probably too warm). All my fault. I should have followed the recipe exactly and not messed with it!

I ended up creaming together 12 ounces (1 1/2 blocks) of cream cheese, 4 T (1/2 stick) of butter, 2 cups of powdered sugar and 2 t vanilla for a frosting. It was yummy and easy.

My co-workers really liked it. I could smell the coconut from my desk! I pushed off the dental floss and enjoyed the cake and cream cheese frosting.

You can find the recipe on Gigi's blog but you should really buy the book: Sky-High Cakes by Alisa Huntsman. All the recipes have been sooooo good!! Can't wait for next month's selection!