Tender, homemade coconut cake made easy in a sheet cake, finished with a 7-minute, divinity icing, shredded coconut and here, with a sugared cranberry and mint leaf garnish. 

Homemade Coconut Sheet Cake with Divinity Icing

I love a coconut layer cake during the holidays. It's a beautiful presentation on a holiday dessert table, covered in a perfect divinity icing and dusted all over with fluffy, white coconut. I just looks like heaven on a cake stand!

Unfortunately, while I think I'm a fairly decent cook overall, I am definitely not a baker, and though I can pull off a pretty good pan of brownies, cookies even, or a snack cake, well... layer cakes aren't my forte.

Mandarin Orange Cake is what this dessert is typically known as in this part of The Deep South, but in many other areas of The South, this is more commonly known as Pig Pickin' Cake, though it has many names.

Mandarin Orange Pig Pickin' Cake

How y'all liking that vintage Tupperware Cake Taker plate up there?

I know for photo styling I should have used my mama's fancy footed cake plate, but this is one of those refrigerated cakes so in the cake taker it went. This one, in that classic mustard color, dates back to the 70s of course, and has been used many, many times. I actually have two of them - one was mine from back then and the other my mama's, which she very well may have purchased at a Tupperware party at my house!

I also have the rectangular one for sheet cakes. Anybody else still have one of these oldies hanging around?

A light, tender yellow butter cake with a classic boiled icing, traditionally made from burnt sugar or for more modern versions, with boiled brown sugar.

Southern Caramel Cake

As soon as I knew they were making a movie from the book The Help (#ad), I knew I wanted to make a caramel cake for the website. Really, from the first time I read about Minny's caramel cake in the book in 2009, I knew I'd be making one. There is just something about this book that makes you want a caramel cake... and maybe never want to eat a chocolate pie - at least for awhile. You'll know what I mean on all of the above counts if you read the book.

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My intention had been to make this cake over the past weekend, but I was dragging my tail-end here recently thanks to fighting off a summer cold while simultaneously pulling a muscle in my back and found my motivation lacking.

With the film making its debut at the theater Wednesday, I decided to make the cake anyway, and found myself up at 2:00 a.m. that morning icing a cake!

A classic southern cake that usually makes its appearance over the Christmas holidays.

Mama's Red Velvet Cake

This was a traditional Christmas cake around our house growing up and it is as moist as it is pretty. I can barely think of Red Velvet Cake without thinking of my Mama, and it is the Christmas season where my heart gets real heavy on missing her.

I have heard that there is a newer evolution of red velvet cake that substitutes cooking oil for the real butter used in the original cake. I can't imagine why. Why you would want the oily residue of a cooking oil versus the flavor impact and richness of butter is beyond me, though I think it probably has something to do with the mouth feel texture result, which would probably be somewhat similar to a box cake mix that so many people use. If so, then just use the box mix I say! As far as me, I don't know that I'll go messing around with something that I know is delicious and good... and works!

Homemade Butter Cake with Pineapple Filling and Buttercream Cream Cheese Frosting

A basic scratch butter cake recipe that produces a light, fluffy and moist cake.

Homemade Butter Cake

I'd be the first to tell you that I'm not much of a cake maker. Just have not made near enough of them to get very good with it I suppose, unlike my Mama who turned out perfect cakes. So, when I decide I want a cake, most often I'll just pull out a 9 x 13 inch pan, whip up some icing and be done with it. But when I went to make this cake, I changed my mind and decided that I wanted to do a layer cake, despite the fact that I have never been very good at layer cakes and never mind that I can't even recall the last time that I actually did make a layer cake.