This is a really old, quick recipe that one of the girls use to cook for an oven demo. She gave me a copy of the original page from the Australian Women’s Weekly and it’s from 2002! Goes to show that good recipes never go out of fashion.
I thought this would be a nice cake to serve for a friend’s birthday lunch, the addition of the rhubarb and texture of the coconut works really well. I always love cakes that have fresh fruit included as there is no need for any icing (but a dusting of icing sugar doesn’t go astray).
I have discovered that if you use thin sticks of rhubarb and slice them all the same, smaller size say 1-2 cm each then it doesn’t all sink to the bottom. With the rhubarb visible on the top then there is no need to add the icing sugar. I have also decreased the sugar from the original recipe and it was still delicious.
Ingredients: Serves 10-12
1½ cups Self raising flour
1 cup caster sugar
1¼ cups desiccated coconut
125g butter, melted
3 eggs, beaten lightly
½ cup milk
½ tsp vanilla essence
½ cup chopped rhubarb (thin stalks, cut about 1-2 cm)
2 stalks rhubarb, extra
2 tbsp. Demerara sugar (or enough raw sugar to sprinkle over)
Method:
- Preheat oven to 180°C or 160°C Fan forced
- Grease a 20cm round cake pan and line the base with paper
- Combine flour, sugar and coconut in a medium size bowl
- Stir in butter, eggs, milk and extract until combined
- Spread half the mixture into the prepared pan, scatter rhubarb over mixture
- Cover with remaining batter
- Arrange remaining rhubarb over top of cake. Sprinkle with Demerara or raw sugar. I didn’t use it all.
- Bake for approximately 1 hour.
- Rest in pan for 5 minutes before turning onto a rack to cool.
Serve with whipped cream 🙂
Hi Trudy
What are you trying to do to us with all these tasty puddings???
We are starting to hit autumn in Scotland and while it’s very pretty, it’s cold at night and early mornings. My excuse for this is to eat more food!
I take it you could use apples, pears or plums in place of rhubarb (which i love) which is why I like your recipes. They are so versatile.
Keep them coming.
Wendy
Hi Trudy
I haven’t tried this yet but I know it will be good as it’s the same basic recipe as my never fail Coconut Lime Syrup Cake
Just omit the rhubarb and make the lime syrup to pour over when it comes out of the oven. Serve with cream, ice cream or my favourite – creme fraiche and an extra drizzle of syrup
Lime Syrup
• 3 limes, rind finely shredded, juiced
• 1/2 cup white sugar
Make lime syrup Combine 1/2 cup lime juice and sugar in a saucepan over medium heat. Bring to the boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer for 5 minutes or until syrupy. Stir in lime rind.
Pour hot lime syrup over hot cake. Allow cake to cool in pan before releasing side of pan. Cut into slices and serve.
I’m loving your site and experimenting in my new combi steam oven.
Thank you again
Judy
Thanks Judy I will try your lime version!