 Hey y'all, it's Timmy with Collard Valley Cooks. And this is where we cook like mama did. This is my mama's coconut cake. It's a fresh coconut cake with her snow white layers, has cream of coconut and coconut milk in it. Oh, is it going to be good? It's so juicy, you have to put it in a pot plate. Hey y'all, it's Timmy with Collard Valley Cooks. You can hear the birds singing this morning in my kitchen. We are using white lily flower and making my mama's recipe for white cake. We use all egg whites so that it's a pretty snow white cake. And we always make these layers for our fresh coconut cake for Christmas every year. We're going to get started with adding our shortening and butter. So we're going to start with a stick of butter, which is a half cup. So here's a half cup of shortening. Now we're going to add our sugar. It's a cup and three quarters. I reduce the sugar in my cakes lots of times because you put so much sugar on the outside of them, there's really no need for them to be super sweet. So we're going to use about a cup and three quarters. And we're going to get this mixed up and then we're going to add our egg whites. With all mixers, it's good to scrape it. In between. Now we're adding six egg whites. See how creamy that looks now? My mama would have called that a little bit frothy. Because we use white lily flower, it's nice and fluffy. It's a white winter wheat. There's no need for me to sift it. And since I'm not sifting, I go ahead and I put in my baking powder, my salt, and my soda into the cake at this point. So we're going to use two teaspoons of baking powder, half teaspoon of baking soda, and a half teaspoon of salt. We're going to get that mixed in good before we add our flour. We're going to use one and a half cups of buttermilk. This is whole buttermilk. I like it because it's nice and thick. Makes a really good cake. All right, we're going to be putting in two teaspoons of vanilla flavoring and then we'll be adding our buttermilk and our flour alternately. We'll be using two and a half cups of flour and one and one half cups of buttermilk and two teaspoons of vanilla extract. I have to tell y'all because when I turn this mixer on, you can't hear me. We're going to scrape the sides, get it mixed up about 30 more seconds. You want to mix a cake mix about two minutes and that's about it. Because that flour starts reacting with that baking powder, nothing reminds me of my mother more than cake batter. My mother catered weddings and she was a wonderful cake decorator. And we were around cake mix and icing our whole life. And of course we got to lick the bowl and she made tons of cake batter. This is her recipe for white layers and boy is it good. Now if you want to make a yellow layer and you want to use the yellows of the eggs, I have a different recipe for that cake that mama made. All right we're going to get these in our pans and I'm going to bake this in the oven at 325 degrees because I don't want it to get real brown. You want your white snow white fresh coconut cake to be beautiful and white on the inside. So you don't want to bake your cake and have it dark on the outside. You want it to be really pretty. All right today I'm going all out and greasing and flouring my pans instead of spraying them with baker's joy because it's Christmas and that's how mama done it. So that's how I'm going to do it today. I missed her. My mom passed away a couple years ago. She had dementia. Let's see about eight years before she passed away and she had an autoimmune disease and so I was sad to see her go but I know where she's at and that makes me very happy because I know she's with her Lord and Savior Jesus Christ this Christmas. And every day we're going to take some shortening and grease these pans. Make sure you use your fingertips to get around them edges. Now I love these pans. They're Nordic wear and they do a really good job of browning the cake and it not get too dark or too you know you take a little bit of flour and sprinkle in one and then you let it go around the pan. So you're just going to pat it all around the bottom and then you're going to turn it on its side and let the flour go around the edge like that and beat it out good so that you don't have a lot of flour in the corners. Now my cake mixes that are in our first cookbook they all have about two and a half cups of flour that is too much batter for two eight inch layers. It would work for two nines it'll work in a sheet cake pan but if you're using rounds and you're using eight inches make sure you use at least three layers okay and I know for this too a lot of people make my pound cake it's wonderful but it makes a lot of cake batter and so if you've got a standard butt pan there's too much batter in it as well you have to use the 12 cup one just a heads up to keep in mind when you're using my recipes I give you lots of batter because I'm going to tell you these boxes just don't cut it anymore they keep reducing and reducing the amount of cake batter you get and so it's much better to use that white lily flour and make your own cake mixes all right so we're gonna use four today because I want this to be a nice tall showy cake and I'm going to put a heaping cup in each one once they all have this cup then I'll just try to give the rest in here equally a little bit a little bit a little bit and I always like to save a bite for me yes I eat my cake batter that's what reminds me of my mother goes so just spread it around in your pan good now mama always beat hers on the counter to get all the air bubbles out especially if you're using a hand mixer it puts more air in the cake batter so we're going to do that today my dog's may bark we had a few little bubbles that popped on the top there's one that's about to pop but you can do that everybody will have a different amount in there if you don't over beat your cake the less air will be in there also try to use a paddle if you've got a stand mixer are we going to get these in the oven now I do have my rack not in the center of the oven because of I like to video the timelines for you guys but if you're making these at home then um you would have a more centered but this oven does a wonderful job so I'm not worried about that it is a gas oven and the bag will get a little bit warmer than the front so they may get done quicker so don't overcook the ones on the back and let them get too dark if you do it like I'm doing it layers on the back are done and the ones on the front just need a couple more minutes it doesn't hurt to take a cake out quick and put it back in you can see it's already pulling away from the sides it's really done it's just not as dark as the other ones I won't go ahead and take them out if your cake is pulling away from the sides like you can see here then you know it's done and you can really tell the difference in the ones in the back from the ones in the front now when you make yours at home you can use two different racks or cook them at different times but today for time's sake I just cooked them all at one time on one rack for y'all now once these cool down about 10 minutes or so and they get cool to the not cool but cool enough that you can pick up the sides without getting burned it's still going to be warm we're going to flip them out on some parchment paper and we're going to go ahead and start mixing up our icing for this coconut cake we're out in the sunroom I'm going to flip these out out here and let them start cooling down because it is cooler in this room nice fluffy white cake okay we're going to be using cream of coconut now cream of coconut is not the same thing as coconut milk coconut milk is thin and watery cream of coconut has the fat of the coconut in it and it's creamy and most of the time when you open it it's got a layer of fat on the top so we're going to open this up this is a 15 ounce can and this recipe is actually in our first cookbook because this is a very common thing that I make every Christmas and I made this my first cookbook right around before Christmas the first year that I started the show this is it so we're going to follow the directions on there we're going to open this cream of coconut and we're going to put it in a bowl because I want the grease to be mixed up in in the cream of coconut too so you want to get it good and creamy and mix together good and I'm going to take my whisk and I'm just going to mix it really good together to get that fat in there and we're going to use three quarter cups of this in our icing and then the rest of it we're going to put in our fresh coconut this full pretty much just or close to full is three quarters of a cup and that's how much we're going to need in our icing seems like a lot don't but now I like my icing really thin for this and we're going to take the rest of this and we're going to put it in our coconut I'm about to show you what kind of coconut this is I'll just give me a second so get all of it out and into your coconut and now you're going to use about three quarter cups of lukewarm water and you're going to put in the coconut to don't use hot water because coconut sour is really easy and this is fresh coconut this cake has to be refrigerated I'm just rinsing out the rest of this cream of coconut make sure I get it all and we're going to pour this in here now we're using bird's eye fresh coconut you find it in the freezer section near the cool whip these are small packages so you need six of these there's six ounces to make a good coconut cake if you want to put plenty of coconut on it which I like now do not make sure that when you thaw these you put them in the refrigerator two or three days before you want to use them and do not thaw them in the microwave it'll cause the coconut to sour now we're going to take the coconut and we're going to mix up the water and the cream of coconut in it and this is really cold and it should be so I'm going to have to go back and forth and rinse my hands with hot water just so they don't freeze to death it's really not soupy enough for me I'm going to actually open up this coconut milk and pour a little bit in here this is a part of the recipe but you're getting an even better tip watching today no wait but this coconut's actually sweetened already um it tastes really good but it's just up to you whether or not you can taste your coconut see if it's sweetened and if it's not you can always add a little sugar water to it instead of just the plain water it's totally up to you all right we're going to make our buttercream we're going to start with a half stick of room temperature butter we're going to start with a half stick of butter that's at room temperature we've got our three quarter cups of our cream of coconut and we're going to put this in here I'm going to save out just a little bit just to make sure that it's not going to be too runny we're going to use a couple of teaspoons of this vanilla or at least one and now we're going to turn this on and add powdered sugar we're going to be using around four cups of powdered sugar and you want this icing to be thin because it's just good on the cake that way I think it's better than it being thick with this coconut on there we're going to start adding our four cups of powdered sugar we're going to do a fresh coconut cake mine is soupy enough that I use something to catch the goodness okay I never just put it on a flat cake plate you can use a paper doily like you see here and then place your cake on top of it if you use a clear pie plate and it's still going to be pretty on the table so I just thought I'd tell you guys that because if you put this on a flat cake plate it's going to run the juices are going to run out of it and you don't want a sticky mess in the car or on the rides or wherever you're going or even in your refrigerator so we're going to start out with the pie plate this is just a standard nine inch anchor hawking pie plate and we're going to start with our first cake layer place it in the bottom and you can see how fresh this cake looks it is going to be divine and remember for every layer that you plan to do like if you're only going to do a two layer cake you're not going to need so much coconut but you can really pile it in between them okay so you're going to put your layer down you're going to use your buttercream and put a thin layer of buttercream and if you freeze your cake layers they'll be a lot easier to ice mine are very fresh I just made them this morning and they have not cooled down even all the way I mean they're cool but they're not cold so I can ice cake like that but I wouldn't suggest you do it if if you're not you know an experienced cake iser make sure you got it stacked on there in the middle and then you're going to take this beautiful coconut and put on top of it and you're going to do every layer that way this coconut's nice and moist and got plenty of juice in it and I really use a lot of coconut y'all I don't skimp this is my last one isn't that pretty already now to do this one I'm going to put plenty of icing on the top but then the icing is the easier it's going to be to to ice the cake as well so you can also make it a little bit thinner if you want to all right I just take the icing and I push it over the edge to do the sides as soon as you get this cake iced it needs to go in the refrigerator and this cake is best after it's set in the refrigerator for about two or three days even if it sits in there a week it's fine and better now this icing don't have to be thick because we're going to pile it on top with coconut just a little bit left so we're going to try to get it on the sides right let's fill this thing full coconut I'm going to get it nice and flat on the top get this little edge off of it all right it's about to be a beauty we're going to put our coconut on the top boy nothing was as popular at christmas time than this fresh coconut cake mama made now when I was a really young girl she would make seven minute icing and use seven minute icing but over the years I have tweaked it and tweaked it until this is just my favorite way of making this cake easiest way to do sides of a cake is to pick it up hold it over the bowl and I know you got to be strong to do it but it's the easiest way to do it and then take your coconut and you just got to mash it on there because it's wet and y'all can hear how wet it is by listening to it on my in between my hands turn it on and I had just enough you really won't at least let's see we had three yet you at least need two or three for the sides and one for in between the layers according to how many layers you're going to have so I'm usually safe and just use six that's my coconut cake now it's taller than that because it's down in this nine inch if you make this cake and with nine inch layers you can't put it in a pipe plate you're going to have to find something else to put it in are y'all ready we're going to cut this cake and it has not been refrigerated yet and it is so fresh we just made the cake a few minutes ago and put the scene together so when it falls to pieces don't be surprised I'm going to try my best to get a piece out of here without it just falling apart but I want you to see the layers I want you to see the coconut and see how it looks on a plate and of course it would be more solid looking after you refrigerate it it is so moist the knife just goes right down in there real quick that bottom layer is kind of stuck down in the in the pan so you didn't hardly see it and here's the good stuff that was left in the bottom y'all can see the layers and how good it looks we're gonna try this cake it's already delicious and it's not even soaked in the refrigerator yet whoa that's a good cake y'all I love my mama and I loved her cooking thanks for watching collard valley cooks where we cook like mama did and we use our white lily flower like mama did too bye y'all love ya boy nothing was as popular at christmas time than this fresh coconut cake all night