Hope you're having a nice weekend 😁

With the start of a new semester always comes a lot of work for me, so my meals these days have been little works of assembling leftovers, frozen soups and emergency salads (with everything about to go bad, haha). The desserts alone these days have been worth a photo and recipe sharing; so here I go with the first one: a blondie I made with homemade coconut flour.

This cake is halfway between cakey and chewy. For me, super delicious. A moist and soft crumble with little walnut chunks for a good bite and the crispy touch of roasted--actually baked--walnuts on top. The homemade coconut flour I make from coconut bagasse soaks up the moisture from the egg and margarine, making the texture really brownie-like, or should I say blondie-like.

INGREDIENTS

It's a budget friendly treat if, like me, you prepare it with homemade coconut flour. I prepare 1 kg of coconut flour for less than 3$ (this is without taking into account that I have already extracted the milk from the bagasse I use to make it), but if I buy it in the store, I have to pay between 11$ and 16$.

• 75 gr margarine

• 1/2 cup white sugar

• 1/4 cup cane sugar

• 2 teaspoons vanilla essence

• 1/2 tablespoon ground cinnamon

• 3/4 cups egg (I used 3 eggs, M)

• 1½ cups homemade coconut flour

• 100 gr walnuts

• a 8"X8" brownie pan and enough margarine to grease it

I didn't add any salt because the margarine I'm using (Mavesa) is salted. I was going to use coconut oil, but I decided to try margarine for once in this recipe and you can tell the difference. Both versions are delicious to me, but you may want to try and find out for yourselves.

PROCEDURE

I began by mixing the margarine and white sugar.

After the mixture turned a little creamy, I added the brown sugar and mixed again, just a little to incorporate it into the mixture.

Then vanilla essence,

ground cinnamon,

...and mixed.

As you can see below, I used two spoons. I finally got my wooden spoons back, which I prefer for mixing cake batter. I always get to use my silicon pastry spoon, though, becuase it's so good to scrape off the mixture that sticks to the sides of the bowl.

I added the eggs, mixed a little, and added the coconut flour.

As I was mixing the coconut flour, it was soaking in the wet ingredients of the mixture...

I've been experimenting quite a bit with the coconut flour I make at home. I'm thrilled to be able to use this resource, as not only it is economical but I produce it systematically in my kitchen--because I'm always making coconut milk--, and it's gluten free. One of the things I've discovered is that this flour absorbs a lot of moisture, much more than wheat flour, so it's good to let the mixture stand for 20 to 30 minutes so that the coconut flour soaks up the moisture it needs so that your cake is as moist as you like it.

Meanwhile, look for your favorite brownie pan and grease it well. I used margarine to grease mine.

I turned on my little electric oven to preheat to 300° F and poured the cake batter in the greased pan.

Carefully, I distributed the batter in the baking pan as evenly as possible.

Time for Walnuts!

I used only 100 gr of walnuts. I buy a tray of approximately 200 grams once a week. They cost $16.25 per kilo at the supermarket nearest my house.

Only a handful is enough for an 8"X8" brownie, or in this case, a blondie 😄

I crushed a handful of walnuts to incorporate them just below the surface of the cake.

Then I placed some whole ones on top not only for a little decoration but for extra crunchiness.

As you can see below, I filled the pan halfway, not because the mixture would rise much but because this cake shouldn't be tall, about 4 cm or 5 cm at most, since it's oily and the crumb is a little loose.

This blondie went into the oven to bake at 300° F for 45 minutes.

It formed a golden, crispy crust that was, in my opinion, very provocative to the eye.

A moist crumble with a nice golden crust is what you'll get if you try making this cake. The walnut bits only make it better if you ask me.

This cake is officially in my top 10 right now. I think it's delicious besides being gluten-free, lactose-free, and incredibly inexpensive. On top of all this, I don't feel bad about throwing away all that coconut bagasse, which is the best thing for me. 😁❤️

As it is a waterless mixture, this cake lasts more than a week out of the refrigerator perfectly fresh. You'll only notice that, in fact, it becomes denser and easier to cut into pieces without crumbling.

This was the last piece, 8 days later. I ate it up as I was finishing writing this post 👇😋

So tell me, is there any homemade cake that has made it into your top 10 lately? I'd love to know which one and why you liked it so much.

As always, I hope you have found this post useful 😄

All text and images are my own. I have taken the pictures with my Redmi 9T cell phone. And if any GIFs here, I've used GIPHY for all them.

Thank you so much for your visit :)

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