Coconut Orange Cakes

Wotchers!

Here’s a little gem of a recipe I found in a far-off Romanian corner of the internet, on the blog of Laura Laurentin.

Don’t ask me how I got there – it’s all a bit of a blur – but this is an absolutely delightful two-in-one recipe that you can enjoy a variety of ways. And they’re just so pretty to look at!

As a bonus, it provides another way to use the coconut oil you all rushed out and bought a couple of weeks ago for the Coconut Oat Crunchies.

You did all rush out, didn’t you?

When freshly baked, these coconut biscuits are deliciously light and crisp, but if you sandwich them together with the coconut buttercream and a little orange curd and leave them overnight, they soften into a wonderfully crumbly and moist shortcake texture.

You can also make these with either all butter or all coconut oil – there’s more than enough coconut flavour to go round.

I used some Seville Orange Curd, from three of the frozen cubes of juice/zest I made back in January.

Coconut Biscuits

Makes about 40 biscuits / 20 sandwich cakes

1  x 400ml tin of coconut milk
190g plain flour
60g dessicated coconut
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp baking powder
50 grams of unsalted butter
40 g coconut oil
150g caster sugar
1 whole egg
1tsp vanilla extract

• Pour the coconut milk into a small pan and simmer until it has thickened and reduced to 150ml. An easy way to check is to pour the milk into a 150ml measuring cup (or use a 2/3 cup measure). If the cup can be filled and there’s still some milk in the pan, then you need to simmer it a little longer.
• Set the coconut milk aside to cool.
• Preheat the oven to 180°C, 160°C Fan.
• Mix the flour, coconut, baking powder and salt together and set aside.
• Soften the butter and coconut oil and cream together until light and fluffy.
• Add the caster sugar and whisk thoroughly until fully incorporated, light and fluffy.
• Mix in the egg and the vanilla.
• Gradually add the flour mixture in 4 stages, alternating with 4 tablespoons (60ml) of the thickened and cooled coconut cream.
• Pipe the mixture onto parchment paper in 4cm circles. The mixture will spread during baking, so be sure to space them 3-4cm apart.
• Bake for 12-15 minutes, until cooked through and the edges of the biscuit are tinged with brown.
• Cool on a wire rack.

Coconut Buttercream

50g unsalted butter
60g coconut oil
3-4tbs thickened coconut cream
1tsp vanilla
90g icing sugar

• Soften the butter and coconut oil then cream them together until light and fluffy.
• Add the coconut cream, vanilla and icing sugar and whisk until fully combined.

To Assemble

150ml Seville Orange curd
more icing sugar to dust

• Put the coconut buttercream into a piping bag fitted with a small star nozzle.
• Pipe a ring of little buttercream stars around the edge of half the biscuits.
• Add a teaspoon of orange curd in the middle.
• Press a second biscuit on top and dust with icing sugar.
• Cover and leave overnight.