Coconut Cake with White Chocolate Ganache

I am a big fan of desserts... though am equally conscious of my ever fluctuating waistline, I don't mind indulging in a fat rich platter that satisfies my craving for sweet nirvana at times. Being fond of cooking and a dessert lover it's no wonder that I do get myself pepped up with a new dessert once in a while... and I must say, it's a different cooking experience. When the sweet aroma flows out of the pot and fills the house I could just sit with my eyes closed and get lost in a meditative world carried in a magical aromatic cloud of cardomom, cinnamon or vanilla. Ah!!! the thought itself is bliss...

Last week I was invited to a friend's Sister's b'day and I decided to bake her a cake after failing to decide what would be the best gift to buy her. So I prepared coconut cake with white chocolate ganache. Did she like it? She loved it!!!

Ingredients :

200 gm condensed Milk

80 gm flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp soda bi carbonate

60 ml ( 80 gm ) melted butter

1 tsp vanilla essence

1 cup grated coconut

1 cup Almonds ( Soaked in rose water overnight and chopped )

250 gms white cooking chocolate

100 gm fresh cream

Process :

Cake :

Pre-heat the over to 180 C before starting with the preparation.

Mix the flour, baking powder and soda bi carb

Add condensed milk, melted butter, grated coconut, essence and two table spoons of water and beat gently.

Grease a baking tray with butter and sprinkle flour on the surface. You may put a butter paper at the bottom.

Pour in the batter into the baking tray and place it in the oven immediately.

Let the cake bake at 180 C for 25 min. Let it cool down when done.

Ganache :

In a double boiler ( put a vessel filled with water on the burner and then place another vessel in it such that it get's heat only from the boling water underneath ) put the fresh cream and let it come to a boil.

Add chunks of white cooking chocolate and stir till it's all melted and mixed with the cream.

Let it cool.

Cut the cake in half horizontally.

Soak both the halfs with the rose water in which the almonds were soaked.

Spread a fourth of the white chocolate ganache on one of the halfs and put the other half on top of it.

Pour in the remaining ganache on top and let it run down the sides of the cake on it's own.

Sprinkle all the chopped almonds on top and put the cake in the refrigerator so as to solidify the ganache and stop it from running down too much.

Coconut cake would be ready in 10 min :-)