Social Kitchen

You know what I love most about this time of year?  The color orange.  It’s everywhere!  I mean, besides the leaves changing to a bright saffron colored hue, it’s also the color of my favorite winter vegetables – sweet potatoes, and butternut squash and pumpkin!

With Thanksgiving only a week away, my favorite orange colored dish is just waiting to baked – pumpkin pie.  Nope, not the one with the fresh pumpkin where you add spices and sour cream or whipped egg whites, or cream or anything else that makes it absolutely divine.  I’m talking about the kind where the pumpkin and spices are already mixed for you in a can and you just pour it into a ready-made, store-bought crust.  Don’t judge.  It’s absolutely delicious and I wouldn’t want anything else for the holiday.

Needless to say, a post about canned pumpkin pie wouldn’t have cut it.  So I decided to step it up this year.  This sweet potato pudding cake has the texture of my beloved pumpkin pie, but a little more dense, a little less sweet and salutes my love affair with both the color orange and coconut.  It’s moist, luscious and has found a place next to my traditional pie on the Thanksgiving table.

Sweet Potato Pudding Cake (adapted from here)

Ingredients for Cake:
2-3 medium sweet potatoes (about 1 pound)
2 tablespoons coconut rum
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon grated nutmeg
3 large eggs
14 ounce can coconut milk
1 cup packed light brown sugar
2 tablespoons butter, melted

Ingredients for topping:
1/2 cup shredded coconut
2 tablespoons packed brown sugar
1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Method
1. Cook sweet potatoes by baking in a 400 degree oven until tender (45 to 60 minutes).  Alternately, you can microwave the potatoes on high for 12 to 15 minutes. Let cool, then remove the peel and mash potato until smooth.

2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Spray a 9” round springform pan with cooking spray.

3. In a large mixing bowl,  beat mashed sweet potato and eggs until smooth and combined. Mix in coconut milk, brown sugar, rum and butter, blending  until combined.Sift in  dry ingredients and stir just until moistened. Scoop mixture into prepared pan.

4. In a separate small bowl, stir together coconut, brown sugar and cinnamon – sprinkle over the top of the cake batter.

5. Bake cake until a knife inserted into the center comes out clean, about 60 to 75 minutes. Remove from the oven and place pan on a wire rack to cool for 10 minutes.

6. Let cool in the pan for 10 minutes. Gently run a thin bladed knife around the edge of the pan and slowly remove side ring – let cake cool for an hour, then place into the refrigerator until cold, about 3 hours.

This entry was posted on November 18, 2010 at 11:19 pm and is filed under cake, sweet, Uncategorized.

Tags: pudding