Apology for my absence but a fantastic cake to make up for it :))

I must apologise for my absence, in July, on my birthday actually; I took my grandmother to the hospital for some tests results to find out that she has terminal cancer and was only given two to three months to live...pretty heartbreaking, but two months on and she's still here although she is fading fast! These last two months have been spent with her and also making the most of the holidays with my son and he really has taken my mind off of it while we have been doing a million and one activities! Baking has taken a bit of a back seat but every so often I have managed to make my way to the kitchen to prepare something new or try something completely different...don't worry I'm still cooking all the time just not as experimental as I normally am! I have been updating my facebook page a little bit more (sorry blog) so I will try and catch up with myself so my first recipe has to be something that came to me from a wonderful trip to the pick your own with my son. We have been many times and we have so much fun especially when we get to make something with all the great fruit and veg we pick. As courgettes are now coming into season what perfect way to use them than to make a cake (I hear you all cheer) I love courgettes and as like carrots they bring a fantastic moist quality to cakes. I decided to not go down the chocolate and courgette cake route and opted for something that I had come up with and not heard of before, whether that would work, time would tell and thank goodness it did :))! This really is one of the best cakes I've made and the taste is fantastic and with a slice adding up to one of your five a day who can argue hehehehe :))

Courgette, Coconut and Macadamia Nut Cake with a Coconut and mascarpone Icing

Cake

100ml coconut oil

150ml vegetable oil

200g caster sugar

3 eggs

200g self raising flour

75g dessicated coconut

100g macadamia nuts toasted

250g cougette coarsely grated 

Coconut Icing 

50g cream cheese (Philadelphia)

200g mascarpone

4 tbsp icing sugar

40g dessicated coconut

Pre heat the oven to 180/170c fan.

Grease and flour 2 x 8" cake tins and set aside 

Into a bowl add the oil, sugar and mix well, add the eggs and beat until well incorporated

In a separate bowl add the flour and coconut and slowly add this to the egg mixture and fold in gently.

Add the courgette and macadamia nuts and fold them in gently.

Pour evenly into the cake tins and pop into the oven for 30-35 minutes until a skewer inserted comes out clean (springs back when you touch the top centre of the cake)

Allow to cool and then remove from the tins and place into cooling racks

Mix the cream cheese, mascarpone and icing sugar in a bowl and stir through the coconut

Place one of the cakes onto a cake stand. Smooth the icing over the top of the cake and place the other cake on top

Enjoy :))