Jamaican Grater Cake

For February's Jamaican Desserts Challenge, we decided to tackle grater cake. Grater cake is grated coconut cooked in a sugar syrup until thick and then left to set. You also colour a portion a pretty pink. This was the most challenging one so far for me. I certainly didn't do myself any favours by going in with the thought that any recipe that calls for cooking sugar just never works for me.

The recipe isn't hard - at least, it shouldn't be. I used one from Grace Foods. The recipe states that you should  "Stir constantly until mixture thickens." I didn't know how thick was thick enough and I left it on a bit too long. There was then a mad dash to scrape it out the pan, spread it, colour some and spread that. Some parts crumbled and didn't set together. But it still tasted just like grater cake.

Not quite there but still tasty

I do want to try this again and play around with the sugar to coconut ratio. I also want to watch someone who knows what to do so I can know when to stop cooking it. I'll wait until I can watch someone before I throw more sugar and coconut at this.