December 9, 2010
“Dessert has a lot to do with how people feel about a dinner. What we really remember is the rich lime tart or the sinful pecan bars that came at the end."-- Ina Garten, from "Barefoot Contessa at Home"
It is indeed the season of sinful desserts, and what would Christmastime be without those sweet finishes to our holiday meals?
Every family has their own holiday dessert traditions that run the gamut from simple sugar cookies decorated with red and green sprinkles to gourmet Crème Brulee or fancy Christmas Coconut Cake (my personal favorite).
Recently, I made my grandmother's rich walnut fudge, my mother's heavenly Divinity and her fancy strawberry candy and my dad's annual lime sherbet Christmas Eve punch. They were finished before breakfast, too.
How did I accomplish this superwoman feat, you ask.
It happened like this.
The other day while my beautician Ann was cutting my hair, she told me that she did her holiday baking in her head, and it was all finished. Confused, I asked, "What on earth do you mean?"
"Simple," she said. "When I wake in the morning I lay in bed awhile and think about all the wonderful desserts I will bake that day. They are done before my feet hit the ground. And if I make a mistake, it is easy to fix."
We laughed, and I said that I loved the idea. "Maybe I'll clean my house that way, too," I told her. She whispered, " I am ahead of you and tried that already. I scrubbed the kitchen, cleaned the woodwork and light fixtures and washed the windows today before I came to work, in my head."
What a brilliant plan, I thought. It has limitless possibilities.
But, back to using her system to create naughty but nice holiday desserts, in one's head that is.
Today, I tried baking my neighbor Susan's Three-Day Christmas Coconut Cake. It took only 5 minutes of daydreaming.
No calories. No work. No mess. Does not take three days.
However, if you prefer to savor, taste and delight in the actual cake itself, I guess you should bake it the old-fashioned way using real ingredients, not imaginary ones. Oh yes, an oven helps.
Here's the recipe whether you bake it in your daydreams or in the oven.
Either way you will love it.
SUSAN'S THREE-DAY COCONUT CAKE
One yellow cake mix, bake in two 9-inch round pans.
Cool and splice each layer in two pieces.
Fill layers with the following, reserving 1 cup of filling
16-ounce container sour cream
2 cups coconut
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
ICING
1 medium carton whipped topping
1 cup reserved filling
Mix and spread on cake
Sprinkle with coconut and cover---- refrigerate 3 days. (It freezes well, if needed.)
To die for coconut cake.
Choose your poison my friends--the real thing (totally naughty) or the nice one, the calorie-free, easy-to-bake recipe baked only in your dreams.
Personally, I say let us eat cake.
