Lime Cake with Coconut Frosting

I am in love.  It's true.  I find myself wanting to bake all the time and make scrumptious things; the slightest reason to make something and I'm off to the kitchen!  With whom am I in love, you may be asking?  Well, with what might be the more appropriate question.  It's a cookbook. Weekend Baking by Sarah Randell.  She's British (I think) and has you tipping in and whisking about!  I'm pretty sure she means add and mix - or at least that's what I do and it seems to be working.  Anyway, it's a great cookbook with thoughtfully paired flavors - not your regular run-of-the-mill recipes that you see everywhere.  And the recipes are pretty simple, because who wants to spend your weekend working on a complicated recipe?

This particular recipe is one I've made 4 times.  Well, twice really; the second time I made 3 cakes.  It's deliciously limey and fresh.  The cake itself is a little on the sweet side, which pairs perfectly with the less sweet, but very coconutty frosting.  It's paradise in a slice.  Literally.

Lime Cake with Coconut Frosting
1 1/2 sticks butter, softened
3/4 cup sugar
1 1/3 cups self-rising flour
3 eggs
finely grated peel of 2 limes

Lime Drizzle
1/2 cup confectioners' sugar
freshly squeezed juice of two limes


Coconut Frosting
6oz. cream cheese, room temperature
5 T coconut cream (I also used coconut milk, and reduced on the stove to cream)
2 T confectioners' sugar
grated peel of 1 lime (use a zester, if you have one, rather than a fine grater)

a 7-in. round, deep cake pan, lightly buttered and baselined with baking parchment

1.  Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and prepare the pan. If your pan is not deep, I found that lining the sides with parchment that stuck up over the edges slightly helped the cake rise straight as well as kept the edges from getting too dark.

2.  Combine the first 5 ingredients in a large bowl with an electric mixer and beat until combined.

3.  Spoon the batter into the prepared pan and spread evenly. Bake in preheated oven for about 50 minutes - check 10 minutes early as mine have sometimes finished that quick! Bake until cake is golden brown and a skewer comes out clean when inserted into the center of the cake.

4.  While the cake is baking, make the lime drizzle sauce: sift the confectioners' sugar into a bowl and stir in the lime juice. Set aside.

5.  To make the frosting, combine the first three ingredients in an electric mixer until smooth and creamy. (If you are reducing coconut milk to make the coconut cream, it will take almost a whole can of coconut milk to get 5 tablespoons and will take a bit of time!  It's probably the most time-consuming part of making this otherwise quick cake! Feel free to do this step ahead of time and refrigerate the cream in an airtight container a day or two in advance.) Refrigerate icing until needed.  Allow a few minutes for the frosting to warm before spreading on cake - doesn't take too long to be spreadable though!

6.  When the cake is done baking, remove it from the oven and with a fine skewer, make holes all over the cake, about 1-inch apart, that reach down the bottom of the cake.  Spoon the lime drizzle over the entire cake, allowing it to soak in.  Let the cake cook completely in the pan on a wire rack.

7.  Once cold, pop the cake out of the pan, remove the parchment paper, and spread the frosting over the top. Sprinkle with the lime peel.

Enjoy!