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.