Lemon and coconut syrup cake

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Well not today! A lemon and coconut syrup cake was on the menu today for a little afternoon treat. It originally started off just as a way to use up some of the abundance of lemons my parents had on their tree (thanks again!) but a normal lemon cake is something I make regularly so I decided to add some coconut for another flavour dimension and make this cake with greek yogurt making it delectably moist.

 

Lemon and coconut syrup cake

Prep time:20  Cooking time:40  minutes  Serves:8

Ingredients:

• 3 eggs
• 1/3 cup lemon juice (for me this was 2 and a half lemons)
• Zest of a large lemon
• 1 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup coconut oil
• 1 cup of greek yoghurt
• 2 cups of self raising flour 
• Shredded coconut to top 

{For lemon syrup}

• 1/3 cup lemon juice
• zest of 2 lemons
•  1/2 cup castor sugar
• 2 tbs of water

Method:

1. Preheat oven to and grease cake tin. Make sure it ISN'T springform as you will be pouring syrup over it while in the tin and don't want to lose any of the sweet flavour. I used a silicon heart mould from ikea.

2. In a large mixing bowl crack the eggs and beat together with the sugar until they are pale and creamy.

3. Zest and juice the lemons and stir into the egg mixture.

4. Pour in the yoghurt and coconut oil to the batter and stir to combine.

5. Sift over self raising flour and fold into mixture. 

6. Pour into tin and bake for 30-45 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean. While the cake is baking make the syrup as directed in the following steps.



7. In a small saucepan combine ALL ingredients listed for lemon syrup. Stir over a low-medium heat until the sugar is dissolved and syrup has thickened. 

8. Immediatley after pulling the cake from the oven, stab at least 20 more holes into it so the syrup will sink in more easily and pour syrup onto the cake in an even layer.

9. Add the shredded coconut to the pan that held the syrup and this will absorb any left over juices. Then top the cake with the shredded coconut.

10. Stand cake for at least 15 minutes to absorb syrup (I left mine for around 25).

11. Remove  cake from tin and place onto a plate or serving platter and serve cold with extra greek yoghurt or warm with thickened cream.