Coconut Cake - A recipe from Vogue?!?!

I know, right?  For the first time EVER as I was reading the most recent issue of Vogue I came across an article about food....but not just any article, and article that actually involved eating something highly caloric and indulgent.  Not because it was some trendy new diet/healthy eating fad, but because it was sinfully indulgent.  The article was written by a man who was trying to recreate a coconut cake he had stumbled across more than 20 years ago and it had left such an impression on him, he deemed it the best cake he had ever had.

Besides being charmed by the article, at the end they referenced the recipe for the storied cake.  Granted it wasn't printed in the actual pages of Vogue as I think they didn't want to offend their readers by writing the words butter, sugar, heavy cream and more sugar, but they indicated you could find the recipe on the website, and of course they said it was NOT for the beginner baker.

It felt like a personal throw-down challenge...Vogue saying something was difficult to bake? Come on now, what do they know about baking?!?!  So I gave it a shot the other weekend.   The cake wasn't difficult to make BUT was very time consuming.  There are a ton of components, lots of layering, frosting, assembling  etc.  But in the end I have to say, the author was right on....one of the best cakes I have ever made.

So if you have a few spare hours some time and a special occasion to celebrate, bust out your big girl/boy apron and get mixing!

http://www.vogue.com/magazine/article/sugar-high-baking-the-perfect-coconut-cake/#1 

 Hand whipping heavy cream to stiff peaks....not as hard as I thought.  The key was putting the whole thing in the freezer for a few minute before trying to whip by hand.

 The whipped cream then got mixed into the cake batter to help keep the cake light.  Light texture that is, not light calories.... :-)

 The cake was supposed to be 6 layers (3 cakes cut in half), but I short changed one of the cake pans with batter and didn't get a tall enough cake to cut in half, so I ended up with only 5 layers.  I know, right?  ONLY five.

 Assembled and ready for frosting....

The final product.  Amazing cake.  By using unsweetened coconut in spite of all the sugar in the cake and frosting, the whole thing was only pleasantly sweet. Not overwhelming at all and had a great strong coconut flavor (you brush each layer with coconut milk and add some to the cake batter as well).

Kale Chips

I took a shot at making some kale chips after talking about them with my work buddy Tom and my first trip to Whole Foods in about 5 years which brought on serious guilt about needing to eat better.  Kept it super simple...cut the stems out, ripped it into chunks and poured some olive oil over it before throwing them into a 400 degree oven for about 20 minutes.

Good thing I bought two bunches of kale b/c I ate the first batch of "chips" in about 15 minutes all by myself.  These are definitely going to become a go-to snack for the summer!