The best cake I have ever eaten let alone made

I have a birthday luncheon in two days and I offered to bring the cake. I always love a reason to try something new. I got this crazy idea from a new cake blog I found. She combines 2 flavors of cake into to one amazing combo. I think she did vanilla and red velvet.

Around my house lemon is a favorite and with summer coming it seemed like a wonderful idea to start there. When I was looking up good recipes I saw coconut out there and realized I had to combine the two into one great cake of awesomeness.

I will give you a little picture tutorial and then recipes to follow.

First off bake an 8 inch vegan lemon cake and an 8 inch coconut cake. While they are baking make your lemon curd and your coconut frosting.

Then take an 8 inch cake board and draw a 6 inch circle and then a 4 inch circle. Then cut them out.

Lay them on top of your 8 inch cooled cake and with a good serrated knife cut out the shapes. See how I cut a straight line to get to the next circle?
Do this for both the lemon and the coconut cakes.
I wish I had a picture of this next part but you carefully separate each circle and lay them off to the side. I put mine on a cookie sheet I believe.

Now is the fun part. You will put the cakes back together but in an alternating pattern like this.

See how pretty that looks? You will have two cakes with the opposite pattern.

Now you will use the coconut frosting to pipe a well around your cake. This is so that your lemon curd will not leak.

Then with a spoon simply spoon on the curd until you have a nice layer that looks like this.
Place your second circle cake on top of your newly filled layer. It should look like this.

I guess I put a little to much lemon curd because it did spill over just a touch. No worries though. I simply ran my finger along the edge sealing in the curd as I filled in the holes with the excess frosting. I also used extra frosting to fill in line I had made to get to each inner circle.

I put on a nice crumb coat and stuck it into the fridge to finish tomorrow.

But because I did not want to torture my family with the yummy smells I made a mini version. I only had excess cake mix for a 6 inch round . I cut that in half and filled the same I showed you above. I then put the leftover lemon curd on the top because dinner had only a minute or so left until it was time to eat. This is what it looked like.
My husband kept saying, "This is vegan?" Yeah it is and it really is that good. My kids were licking their fingers and licking the plate. The baby called it a donut I think because the curd tastes like jelly filling and the frosting was so donut frosting like.

A 6 inch cake was just the perfect size for my family of 8. If there had been more we would have grown gluttonous and not have been able to enjoy our outing to the park that came afterwards.

I am excited to decorate this cake and have it look pretty as well as taste good.

The lemon cake came straight from the internet. The other recipes I adapted to my vegan needs and the flavors that I wanted.

Vegan Lemon Cake

Ingredients:

1 large lemon (juice and rind)

1 ½ cups all purpose flour

1 cup sugar

1 tsp. baking soda

6 tbsp. vegetable oil

1 tsp. vinegar (Yep, vinegar, but I promise you, you won’t taste it.)

1 tsp. vanilla

Water

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350°.

Sift flour, sugar and baking soda into a mixing bowl. Mix them together fairly well.

Then grate all your lemon rind into a measuring cup.

Then, take your already sorely abused lemon, cut it in half and squeeze the juice from both halves into your measuring cup.

Next add water to your rind and lemon juice until you have filled one cup.

Pour your lemon juice mixture into your bowl of dry ingredients.

Add oil, vanilla, vinegar.

Mix well.

Mixture will foam.

Pour into an ungreased 8 inch cake pan. Bake 25 minutes, or until cake bounces back a bit when you touch its center.

Vegan Lemon Curd

Ingredients:
1 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
3/4 cup cold water
1 3/4 cups white sugar
4 Tblsp. cornstarch
3 Tblsp. thinly grated lemon zest (I used 3 large lemons to get this amount), divided
2 Tblsp. Earth Balance margarine (or other vegan alternative)

6 Tblsp coconut milk (the kind that is meant as a milk replacement found with the other milk in a carton, not the kind found in a can)

Directions:

Combine the lemon juice, water, sugar, cornstarch, and 1 Tablespoon of the lemon zest in a blender. Blend for a few seconds until mixed well.

Pour mixture into a saucepan and add the rest of the lemon zest. Whisk quickly while pot is over medium heat. You want to make sure you are stirring constantly until it comes to a full boil.
Stop stirring and let the lemony liquid boil on its own for 1 minute. It should thicken and turn somewhat clear.

Add coconut milk and Earth Balance, and stir in well with the whisk.
Remove pot from heat. Cool the curd in room temperature air, then you can refrigerate it in a covered container until you want to use it.
It will continue thickening as it cools. This should last about 2 weeks while refrigerated and covered.

Vegan Coconut Butter Cream Frosting

Ingredients:

• 1 cup shortening
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon coconut extract
  
• 1/2 teaspoons clear imitation vanilla extract
• 1/4 teaspoon almond extract
• 1/2 cup coconut milk (the kind that is meant as a milk replacement found with the other milk in a carton, not the kind found in a can)
  
• 8 cups sifted confectioners' sugar

Directions:
Mix shortening, salt, coconut milk, vanilla, coconut, and almond extract, and half of the powdered sugar with a mixer for 5-10 minutes. (it's very important to mix this long)

Add the rest of the powdered sugar and beat just enough to mix in.

Add additional coconut milk for desired consistency.

Vegan Coconut Cake

Ingredients:

• 2 cups white sugar
• 1 cup butter
• 7 egg whites or Energ Egg Replacer equivalent of 5 eggs prepare per package instructions (energ egg replacer is a vegan substitute for eggs)
  
• 1 teaspoon coconut extract
• 1 cup coconut milk (again the kind that is meant as a milk replacement found with the other milk in a carton, not the kind found in a can)
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup flaked coconut

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour (or spray) a 8 inch and a 6 inch round. Sift then mix flour, baking powder and salt together and set aside.
2. In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time; beat well. Mix in coconut flavoring. Add flour mixture alternately with coconut milk, mixing well with each addition. Fold in coconut. Pour batter into prepared pan.
3. Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean.