Apple-Coconut Family Cake

This week’s Tuesdays with Dorie recipe was selected by Amber of Cobbler du Monde. She chose Apple-Coconut Family Cake. You can get the complete recipe on Amber’s blog. This is a really wonderful cake, with a lovely apple/coconut batter topped by apple slices. It’s not super sweet, and fits in well as a coffee cake. I really enjoyed this cake and I can imagine making this any time I want a cake that is simple but special at the same time. It’s also fairly low in fat, which is nice. Just 6 tablespoons of oil in the entire cake.

This cake is quite quick to put together; I think it took longer to peel and dice the apples that anything else! I used a couple of different apples: a Honey Crisp and a Fuji in the batter and then topped with a Granny Smith. It’s what I had on hand and thought that it might add some interest to the cake. I’m not sure that I really could taste the difference, but it was good anyway. We ended up sharing this at work while celebrating a birthday and it was well received from everyone. It’s not nearly as sweet as some other cakes; sometimes you need a break from all that sugar. The diced apples basically melted into the batter, making for a moist cake. This made testing the cake for doneness a challenge, and I ended up baking the cake about 10 minutes longer than specified, but it was well worth the wait!

Recipe from Baking from My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan, page 214