Lamingtons have always called to me with their siren song of sponge cake, chocolate and coconut. Despite being an obsessive baker, I find making lamingtons to be fiddly and messy – and my poor bench is always worse for wear.
Behold – the cheat’s lamington from scratch! My goddess idol Donna Hay created this recipe and I was just about dancing in the streets when I stumbled across this easy, mess-free way to make my fav cake.
Donna Hay removed the messy step of dousing each piece of cake in chocolate icing – rather, the whole cake is bathed in the icing while hot from the oven.
Lamingtons are traditionally eaten on Australia Day where most Aussies have a picnic, BBQ, or head to the beach or lake.
For me, no other dish is as Australian as the lamington, a sponge cake iced in simple chocolate and topped in a flurry of shredded coconut.
This cake can be cut into huge slabs, elegant squares, wedges, or anywhere in between.
Try a piece while it is still warm and experience heaven on Earth. Then try not to eat the whole tray #almostImpossible
GATHER:
125g unsalted butter, softened
2/3 cup caster sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs
1¼ cups plain flour, sifted
1¼ teaspoons baking powder, sifted
½ cup milk
1 cup shredded coconut
chocolate icing
¾ cup icing sugar
2 tablespoons cocoa powder
⅓ cup boiling water
20g butter, melted
LET’S GET TO IT:
Preheat oven to 160°C and grease a 20cm x 30cm shallow pan and line the base with non-stick baking paper.
Place butter, sugar and vanilla in bowl of electric mixer and beat until light.
Add eggs one at a time and beat well, then scrape down sides of bowl with a spatula.
With beater on low sift in flour and baking powder and mix until just combined.
Stir in the milk and tip into pan.
Bake cake for 24-27 minutes or until lightly golden.
While cake is baking make icing: whisk together icing sugar, cocoa, water and butter in a bowl and set aside. Remove cake from oven and while still warm and still in tin, cut into squares and carefully pour over icing. Top with coconut. Leave in tin to cool completely.
the hungry mum 
Love the smiling white rose!
It was the last rose left from a bunch of a dozen long-stemmed white roses the Hungry Dad bought me 🙂
What a great idea! I’m still traumatised at the idea of making them properly by a long ago lamington drive where we had to make the lamingtons ourselves and had icing and coconut dripping from the ceiling! These sound much more sensible 🙂
I have never had these, but they look delicious!
I’ve never made lamingtons before, but I should defenitely try them! :p
You will LOVE them / become addicted to them / want to bake and eat them all the live long day #OrIsThatJustMe
I’ll let you know :p
What an interesting idea just pouring the icing on top! 😀 It would definitely save time.