(Not so healthy but yummy) Chocolate Cake

Woke up this am and made a yummy treat (pictured above) for our guests tonight...

Ingredients

• Chocolate Cake
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 cups sugar
• ¾ cup cocoa
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1½ teaspoons baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup milk
• 3/4 applesauce (unsweetened)
• 2 eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 cup boiling water
• Chocolate Frosting
• 1½ cups butter (2 sticks), softened
• 1 cup cocoa
• 5 cups confectioner’s sugar
• ½ cup milk
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350º F. Prepare two 9-inch cake pans by spraying with baking spray or buttering and lightly flouring.
2. For the cake:
3. Add flour, sugar, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, & salt to a large bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer. Whisk through to combine or, using your paddle attachment, stir through flour mixture until combined well.
4. Add milk, applesauce, eggs, and vanilla to flour mixture and mix together on medium speed until well combined. Reduce speed and carefully add boiling water to the cake batter. Beat on high speed for about 1 minute to add air to the batter.
5. Distribute cake batter evenly between the two prepared cake pans. Bake for 30-35 minutes, until a toothpick or cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean.
6. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for about 10 minutes, remove from the pan and cool completely.
7. Frost cake with Chocolate Frosting.
8. For the Chocolate Frosting:
9. Add cocoa to a large bowl or bowl of stand mixer. Whisk through to remove any lumps.
10. Cream together butter and cocoa powder until well-combined.
11. Add sugar and milk to cocoa mixture by adding 1 cup of sugar followed by about a tablespoon of milk. After each addition has been combined, turn mixer onto a high speed for about a minute. Repeat until all sugar and milk have been added.
12. Add vanilla extract and combine well.
13. If frosting appears too dry, add more milk, a tablespoon at a time until it reaches the right consistency. If it appears to wet and does not hold its form, add more confectioner’s sugar, a tablespoon at a time until it reaches the right consistency.

Whole Wheat Coconut Lemon Almond Bread - DELISH

So I found a Donna Hay recipe for coconut bread and tried it.  It turned out alright but nothing I would run back and bust calories for (which is unusual for her recipes- they are usually mouth watering).

At any rate, I determined to get creative this morning and try again.  I mixed it up (a lot) and here's what I came up with:

Whole Wheat Lemon Coconut Bread:
1c shredded coconut
1c almond flour (you can grind your own almonds but I just bought the flour from Whole Foods)
3c whole wheat flour
2 eggs
1/2 lemon, juiced
3/4c sugar
1 stick of butter - yep, that's right a whole stick (you can cut this back but I didn't want to on this one)
1 whole lemon zested (I used a meyer lemon for juice and rind to make it even better)
1/2c applesauce
1c milk

Whip room temp butter with applesauce until smoothish.  Add egg, lemon zest, lemon juice, and sugar; mixing until combined.  Add almond flour, then milk, then whole wheat flour until combined but not beaten to death.  Pour into greased bread loaf pan (I oiled mine with lemon infused olive oil) and bake for 1.5 hr at 320 or until a toothpick/skewer comes out clean.

Take out of oven and cool to liking.  Can be served with a nice fruit jam.
*****Donna's recipe also called for 2tsp baking powder but I forgot to put it into my version and it still turned out great but I might add it in next time, as this kind of bread is automatically dense bread so it might fluff it up a bit but the bread had no trouble rising for sure.


My house smelled so great I jumped right in after pulling it from the oven and it was delicious!!!