So, I have a confession to make. It’s about coconut.
I _adore_ it.
It may not come as a complete surprise to those of you who have been faithfully reading my posts (just in case you missed the confession that I adore Bounty, here’s a link), but I just can’t have _enough_ coconut.
That warm beautiful nut with its coarse exterior hides more goodness than you could ever realise, right from the beautifully refreshing water it conceals inside of it to the creamy smoothness of its milk-white flesh to the sweetly delicious milk that the flesh yields. Apart from its natural sweetness, it marries naturally with sugar. Oh. My. Goodness.
One of my favourite sweet treats when I was a lazy teenager (yes, I was a lazy teenager, believe it or not) was to simply sauté grated coconut in a pan until it was lightly toasted, sprinkle sugar on it, wait until the sugar melted, and then carry it off to guzzle it in private. *ahem* I did not just tell you that and you will not remember it.
So I adore coconut pie, coconut barfi (a sort of coconut fudge we make here in India) and coconut – everything, but one of my favourite recipes is my family’s recipe for coconut cream fudge. They’re amazing, very easy to make, and is my favourite go-to recipe for when I need a sweet fix in a hurry.
Recipe: A Family Recipe
Photographs: Awanthi Vardaraj
Ingredients:
2 cups finely grated fresh coconut
1 cup milk
1 cup cream
3/4 cup sugar
Method:
1) Mix all the ingredients in a heavy-bottomed pan and bring the mixture to the boil over a high heat.
2) While stirring constantly, cook the mixture until it reduces to half its original content. Lower the temperature and keep reducing and stirring until the mixture forms a firm mass that pulls away from the edge of the pan.
3) Scrape the mixture into a buttered tray and press it down with the back of a spoon or spatula. Mark it into squares as it starts to set; when it is cool, cut it into squares. Store in an airtight container in the fridge.
Awanthi’s Notes:
1) In this post, I decided to roll the mixture into balls instead of setting it like barfi into a tray as the recipe states. You can do whatever suits you best, but if you decide to roll it into balls you will need to work quickly while the mixture is still a little hot. I used silicone gloves to do this, so if you do decide to do this my way, you will need to take precautions!
What is your favourite easy sweet treat? Let me know in the comments!
Enjoy this! Let me know if you make it and how much you loved it!
You make my mouth water!! I do love coconut, although I rarely get around to actually eating it. Not sure why that is.
This needs to change – pronto! 😀
I also LOVE coconut but the Hungry Dad isn’t a fan so I make my coconut-based cakes to take to my friends at work. My guilty pleasure is eating my dark choc ganache [which I always have a tub of in the fridge] by the spoonful. It.Is.So.Good
Ooh, that dark chocolate ganache sounds DREAMY. Did you blog it? 🙂 Also, le gasp. I could never be a closet coconut lover. My future husband had better adore it – and he’d better love cats too. *laugh*