Happy Friday, happy weekend guys! I am 100% ready for the weekend ahead. ‘Twas a very long week to say the least, but not in a bad way, just a busy way! Thankfully we get to end the week with cake, so all is good. And this cake? It really is something special. It’s one I have been dreaming up for well over a year now. Yes, over a year. I first had the idea to make this cake around early March of last year. A coconut cake for Easter sounded just right with everyone home baking. I also figured cake was greatly needed. Long story short, I made the cake, but it didn’t end well and I never ended up sharing the recipe. Yes, I told you guys, I too have recipe fails and that cake I made a year ago was a fail. I was bummed. But sometimes recipes just don’t work out the way I envision them and then they have to be scrapped. And that’s what brings me to the cake we have here today. It’s a version of that cake from last year, but this one is better. It has been adjusted and perfected…I finally got it right. So you see, I’m excited! This cake has been such a long time coming.
Here are all the details
For the cake itself, I adapted my vanilla butter cake to be a vanilla coconut butter cake, adding in coconut and toasted pecans. It’s very simple, just beat the butter with the sugar, then add in all the wet ingredients, then the dry. The key I’ve found is to finely grind the coconut and pecans until they are fine crumbs. If you have a food processor, this is super easy to do. If you don’t have a food processor, give everything a very fine chop, the smaller the better.
For the filling, I like to use my go-to brown sugar frosting that has notes of sweet caramel. The brown sugar melted down adds hints of warm molasses and really deepens the flavor to create an icing that’s perfectly rich and caramel-like. And when you add a touch of vanilla and sea salt along with sweet shredded coconut? Well, it’s hard to say no to a second piece. The final step is to finish off the cake with a creamy layer of whipped vanilla cream. Then cover the whole cake in toasted coconut for that classic coconut cake look.
Slicing those cake layers…
The trickiest part of this cake is slicing the layers in half. Please don’t let this deter you from making this cake. If this step sounds like too much, simply leave the cake as a two-layer cake. It may not be quite as fancy…but still very pretty, and of course delicious! If you’re willing to give the slicing a try it’s really not that hard. Let me walk you through it. One, don’t stress about creating a perfectly even cut. As you can see, my layers are nowhere near perfect, but all turned out OK. Two, use a long serrated bread knife to cut the cake in half. This helps so much with making an even cut all the way through. Three, make sure to cool the cake completely before slicing. Bottom line, don’t stress about having to cut the cake layers in half. It’s not as scary as it may seem and once you layer everything together the cake is going to be beautiful no matter what. And, if you do have trouble and the cake crumbles a bit, don’t worry, those crumbs make for a delicious snack. So embrace those uneven layers…imperfect is in these days. The uneven layers, make each and every cake unique and beautiful.
And with that, I’m hoping you now have the inspiration you need to jump up and spend a couple of hours in the kitchen baking this sweet, extra special, coconut cake. Not only is it fun and pretty, but it’s also amazingly good. I mean four layers of coconut pecan cake, caramel/brown sugar icing, and whipped vanilla cream, plus all the toasted coconut you can find – yep…delicious! Perfect for spring and upcoming Easter!
Looking for other Easter cake recipes? Here are a few to try: Coconut Carrot Cake with Jam Swirled Buttercream Lemon Poppyseed Cake with Citrus Honey Glaze Lemon Coconut Naked Cake with Whipped Vanilla Buttercream Lastly, if you make this Coconut Pecan Caramel Butter Cake be sure to leave a comment and/or give this recipe a rating! Above all, I love to hear from you guys and always do my best to respond to each and every comment. And of course, if you do make this recipe, don’t forget to tag me on Instagram! Looking through the photos of recipes you all have made is my favorite!
