Almond Coconut Cake with Dairy-Free Almond Frosting

 
Last week, Justin and I were planning on having a celebration for both our kids' birthdays down in the Salt Lake area closer to where our families are, and we stayed up late into the night making the cool airplane cake that Taliesin had requested. 

Unfortunately, Lionel woke up late that night with a stomach bug, which meant that not only did we have to reschedule the party for the next weekend, but also we had an entire spice cake with cream cheese frosting to finish off- and less than a month after having made Lionel's birthday cake.  Taliesin was adamant, though, that it couldn't be a proper birthday celebration without some kind of cake, so Justin and I decided that we would find an easy gluten free, dairy free cake so that we could be sure everyone would be able to have a slice, leaving us with less cake to have to take home (and our strategy worked- we only had two pieces left over).  This almond cake recipe from Bob's Red Mill fit the bill- it's not nearly as cute as the airplane, but it was much, much tastier than a box spice cake mix, and not actually much more work in my Kitchen Aid.  Making the almond flour and coconut flour definitely took some time, but it didn't require that much active attention, so it was surprisingly easy to do, and if you don't feel like making the flour yourself and don't mind spending an arm and a leg for it, you could obviously just buy the flour from the store instead of making it yourself. 

Ingredients:
3/4 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
4 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla flavoring
1/4 tsp almond extract
1-1/2 cups almond flour
1/2 cup coconut flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
Frosting (recipe below)

Preheat oven to 350º.  Grease a 9x13 pan with vegetable shortening and set aside.  Don't leave your butter softening in a bowl on top of the back burner while you're preheating the oven, though, or you'll find yourself having to re-solidify it in the fridge before you can make the recipe.  Not that I know this from experience or anything...

In a small bowl, mix together the almond flour, coconut flour, baking powder, and salt, and set aside.

In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, around 7-10 minutes.

Add the eggs, one at a time, beating until fully blended after each one.  Add the milk, almond extract, and vanilla flavoring, and mix until combined.

Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture, and beat until creamy- but this batter is going to be much stiffer and much less smooth than a normal cake batter.

Spread the the cake batter out in the pan and smooth the top.

Bake at 350º about 25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out of the center clean, and let cool completely before frosting.  Mine came out of the oven with a random hole in the middle for no apparent reason.

Frost with your favorite frosting, or use the recipe below for a dairy-free almond flavored frosting that went smashingly.  I decided to adapt a butter frosting recipe I that had to use coconut oil and coconut milk so it would be a dairy free frosting that didn't use shortening (I don't like the flavor of shortening) but if you aren't trying to make your frosting dairy free, you can feel free to use margarine or butter and regular milk.

Ingredients:
1/3 cup coconut oil
4-1/2 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup coconut milk, plus additional coconut milk to desired consistency
1 tsp almond flavoring

Place the 1/3 cup coconut oil in a mixing bowl and refrigerate it for 5 minutes or until relatively solid.  Trust me- you want to do this step.  Originally, I only made a half batch and just used the coconut oil straight out of the cupboard.  My frosting was oddly grainy and very thin- even with a bunch of extra powdered sugar added in.

Once the coconut oil is mostly solid, beat on medium speed until fluffy.  Gradually add 2 cups of the powdered sugar, beating well.  Slowly beat in the 1/4 cup coconut milk and almond flavoring.  Slowly beat in remaining powdered sugar.  Beat in additional coconut milk, if needed, to reach a spreading consistency.

If desired, tint with food coloring, and spread over the cake.