Cooking With Coconut

Coconut is a food with a culinary diversity. You can use the flesh either fresh of dried. You can turn the flesh into flour, milk, cooking oil, and even use the water or juice as a beverage.

The sap of the coconut palm can be used as sugar or a sweetener. The thin outer skin is edible as well and high in fiber.

---

---

Cooking With Coconut

Cooking with coconut products in the form of milk, flour, sugar, and desecrated coconut, can add a unique flavor and texture to whatever you add it to. For example, fruit salads, slaws, cakes, and cookies among others.

---

---

Let’s examine in brief the culinary diversity of a coconut starting with the oil.

Coconut Oil

The modern day cook can use coconut oil as a substitute for butter, vegetable oil, or shortening in baked goods. Use it with roasted vegetables, soups, stir-fry’s and so much more.

When baking with coconut oil it is best to use other ingredients at room temperature, such as eggs and milk for example.

Adding it to ingredients just out of the refrigerator can cause coconut oil to resolidify and will cause your batter to clump up.

Before adding coconut oil to your dry ingredients, always melt it down first.

---

---

Refined coconut oil is neutral, it has no coconut flavor or aroma. It is refined oil to use when cooking at high heat, such as when popping popcorn.

---

Read More Here About – Smoke Point Of Cooking Oils

---

---

Natural coconut oil (unrefined) will not work for stir-frying or deep-frying as it has a low smoke point of 350 degrees Fahrenheit, which means that above that temperature the oil will burn and taste rancid.

As already noted above you can use coconut oil in place of butter. But keep in mind that butter contains water, whereas, coconut oil has not water.

When replacing butter for coconut oil, use about 25% less of it (use oil in its harden form when measuring it out as butter).

Also be sure to increase the non-fat liquid component in the recipe to compensate for the missing water from butter.

As an example, if using eggs in the recipe, add one to two egg whites to compensate for the water. Eggs are about 70% water, with most of it in the whites.

Coconut Sugar

Coconut sugar is actually sap of the coconut palm tree. Similar to sap from a maple tree.

Coconut sugar is an effective sweetener, but it does not function exactly like cane sugar or brown sugar ( sugar with molasses added).

---

View More Here About Maple Syrup

• Cooking & Baking With Maple Syrup
• Maple Syrup – The Same As Cane Sugar

---

---

Coconut sugar doesn’t pack down quite as tightly as brown sugar. It also doesn’t have the same molasses notes, therefore it brings a lighter overall flavor to baked goods it is used in.

Coconut sugar crystals are typically coarse. The same texture as demerara sugar.

---

---

White and brown sugar are very fine grains. To get a similar grain, grind the coconut sugar for a few seconds in a blender or coffee grinder. Don’t grind to long, or it will become powdered coconut sugar.

Grain-size can affect the texture of your baked goods, as sugar grains (coconut or cane) that are too large can make it harder if not, to cream the butter with the sugar.

Coconut sugar burns at a lower temperature than white sugar, which means that you are restricted to using it in recipes like cookies and cakes, but not for making candy or caramelizing.

You will also need to add extra moisture to your batter when opting for coconut sugar. If not, the baked good will result in a dryer and denser crumb.

The extra liquid in the form of wet ingredients can include, yogurt, mashed banana, apple sauce, or egg whites.

Also coconut sap makes for a darker sugar, so don’t use it when the baked good needs to maintain a pale color, like in an angel food cake for example.

Coconut Flour

Coconut flour is best known as a grain free, gluten-free flour.

Coconut flour is not a neutral-tasting flour like wheat flour. If you use it in a recipe with a mild flavor, you will be able to detect nutty coconut notes.

---

---

If you don’t want the flavor but still want to use coconut flour, use it in preparations where stronger flavors will play the main role. Theses flavors can include among others: chocolate, banana and coffee.

Coconut flour is very absorbent, so you’ll need less of it compared to regular flour. Typically, you can replace 1 cup of wheat flour with about 1/4 to 1/3 cup of coconut flour.

Here are some examples.

Here are the coconut flour ratios for a Gluten-Free Carrot Cake With A Cream Cheese Frosting

• 3/4 cup all-purpose gluten-free flour
• 3/4 oat flour
• 1/2 cup coconut flour

Here are the ratios for a Gluten-Free Blueberry Lemon Bread

• 1 1/2 cups almond flour
• 1/4 cup coconut flour

Because it absorbs moisture, you’ll need to increase the amount of liquid in the recipe.

Use additional eggs or other binding agents to help hold your baked goods together, as coconut flour can make them crumbly.

Coconut Milk & Cream

Coconut milk and cream provides for flavorful culinary dishes such as curries and stews.

Coconut milk and coconut cream are similar products, yet they contain key differences. The two are often mistaken as the same product, sometimes leading to botched recipes.

---

---

Coconut milk is shredded coconut meat that is mixed with water and pureed until smooth. The product should not be confused with coconut water.

---

---

Coconut cream is is a very thick cream skimmed off the top of the coconut milk.

Compared to coconut milk, coconut cream has a much higher fat content, containing around 19-22% fat.

---

---

Coconut cream has many different uses in cooking, being used to add thickness to recipes like curries, soups, smoothies and some sweet desserts. Like this Mango Coconut Rice Pudding or these Gluten-free Crepes With Coconut Syrup.

Always shake the can well before opening to ensure the cream and water are well mixed.

Once opened, store coconut milk in an airtight container in the refrigerator and use it within a few days.

---

Savory Dishes With Coconut

• Simple and Easy Beef Stir-Fry with Coconut Milk
• Goan Coconut Chicken Curry with Spiraled Sweet Potato
• Curried Chicken With Coconut Rice & Lime Yogurt Sauce

---

More Deliciously Yummy Recipes

• Roasted Sweet Potatoes With White Miso and Maple Syrup
• Guide To Cooking With Salt
• Fruit-Based Seasonings You Use Every Day Without Even Realizing It
• Easy Chicken Tinga Tostadas: A Flavor-Packed Mexican Classic with an Asian Twist
• Roasted Sweet Potatoes And Chickpeas with Feta, Pomegranate And Maple Tahini