BN Cuisine: Cooking with Cassava – The Dessert

A few weeks ago, we started the ‘Cooking with Cassava’ series. The idea is to show that there are a lot of exciting things we can do with food grown locally in Nigeria. Cassava is one of them. {Click here to see the Cassava Starter} & {Here for the Cassava main}

For the dessert, we’re going to show you how to  make the Garri Cookie Cake.
This is a tribute to my boarding school days; I used to make the meanest garri cake back in the day. For those who haven’t had the great pleasure of making/eating garri cake, let explain this milky deliciousness.
No bake Garri cake is made by combining dry garri with a little water, incorporating butter and sugar to form a cakelike structure. A mixture of Butter, sugar and milk is then created and used as icing. This stuff is really good.

Garri cake is definitely the inspiration behind this garri cookie cake, I had a blind taste test and no one guessed the cake contained garri until I told them. If you are not adventurous enough to try the recipe as is substitute garri with cassava flour.

What You Need

1+1/3 cups Garri. Use fine garri or dry blend regular garri in a blender or food processor until smooth.
1+3/4 cups all-purpose Flour
2 Teaspoons Baking Powder
1 cup Granulated Sugar
100g Butter
4 Eggs – at room temperature
1+1/2 cups Whole Milk (liquid)
2 Teaspoons Vanilla Extract (Optional)

How To
Preheat oven to 350 F and generously grease a baking dish of your choice. In a large bowl, thoroughly combine the garri, flour and baking powder. Set aside.

With the help of a mixer or food processor, cream together the sugar and butter. Beat in the eggs then add in the vanilla.

Add in the flour mix to the creamed mixture and combine well. Finally stir in the milk until batter is smooth. Spoon batter into the prepared pan.

Bake for 30 to 40 minutes in the preheated oven. Cake is thoroughly cooked when a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out cleans. Remove cake from oven and set aside to cool.

For the Coconut milk Topping – You Need
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 cup condensed milk
⅓ cup coconut milk
2 egg yolks
¼ cup shredded coconut (Optional)

How To
Place the flour and half of the condensed milk in a pan and stir to combine. Add the coconut milk and the remaining condensed milk. Cook over low heat for 10-15 minutes, stirring constantly until thickened. Remove from the heat.
Lightly beat the egg yolks in a bowl, stir into the condensed milk mixture until well combined. Preheat the oven on broil at 500F.

Use a straw to make deep holes in the cake spacing about ½ inch apart.

Pour the topping over the cake and spread evenly. Add on the shredded coconut if using. Return the cake to the oven and cook for 3-5 minutes (just until the top is a bit browned).

Remove cake from over, set aside at room temperature until the topping is set and the cake is semi-cooled.

Serve warm with your choice of fruit and other toppings.