German Chocolate Cake Frosting

Today was my husbands birthday and I took a cake to his workplace for everyone. He said he had some people ask for the recipe so I thought I would post it.

I had some chocolate cake mixes on hand from a sale so I just used a box mix. I learned in the cake decorating classes I have taken that it is best to follow the directions to the letter. It keeps the cakes from crowning or falling if mixed at the right speed for the set amount of time. I still end up with small crowns, but I can live with that. I cut them off so the cake looks better anyway.

Small Crowns

Once the cakes have cooled I allow them to sit for 10 minutes (I even set the timer for this one) and then extract them from the pans. I find if I do it any sooner or any later than 10 minutes, they stick to the pans and I end up with a mess. Then let the cake cool for about 30 minutes and start your frosting.

No stick bottoms

Coconut Frosting for German Chocolate cake

1 cup evaporated milk or light cream
1 cup brown sugar
3 egg yolks
1/2 cup margarine or butter
1 tsp vanilla
2 1/2 cups coconut

Combine evaporated milk, sugar, egg yolks, butter and vanilla in a small heavy sauce pan. Do not turn on the heat until you have mixed the ingredients. If you do this will cause the egg to cook before it is mixed in and you have gross egg lumps.

Cook and stir over medium heat until thick (it takes me about 10-15 minutes). Remove from heat and stir in the coconut. Stir until thick enough to spread.

This recipe makes 2 1/2 cups. This is great for a 8-9" double layer round cake, but for a flat cake you can take out 1/3 of the ingredients and it would be better. It makes a little too much for a flat cake.

You can add some walnuts or pecans to it and it is really good as well. I would add about 1/2 cup of chopped nuts.

I forgot to get a picture of the finished product. Sorry! It did look good.