Playing with: Desiccated Coconut

It's a tale as old as time. Girl needs small amount of ingredient. Ingredient is only available in large bags. Girl buys large bag, uses small amount, abandons the rest in the cupboard for ages. Haven't we all seen this old cliché play out before?

Why won't you just... die

But not this time. I have a big bag of desiccated coconut and I'm determined to use it. Here's what I've been doing:

Toasted sesame seeds and coconut.

I'm not going to insult your intelligence by listing the ingredients for this one. The clues are in the title. Dry toast the sesame seeds in a frying pan until they start to turn brown, then add the coconut and stir through. The coconut toasts quite quickly so it won't need long. Mix thoroughly and pour into a little serving bowl to sprinkle on the top of stir fries or other noodle dishes.

I'm a big fan of coconut in a savoury context (especially with chillies), but I think that desiccated coconut in sweets is dangerous territory. The slivers of coconut are chewy and dry the mouth out, so combining that with sugar can make quite a cloying, drying texture (See: coconut liquorice allsorts. Bleurgh).

On the other hand, with the right texture, a bit of coconut can be a subtle, fancy addition. I like to add coconut to white chocolate rice crispy sweets to class them up a bit. I use:

2 cups of rice crispies
100g white chocolate
2 tbsp desiccated coconut

Melt the chocolate and mix the rice crispies and coconut in thoroughly. Put a teaspoon each in a little cake or petit fours case and leave to set.

The favourite recipe I came up with involves mixing the coconut with breadcrumbs to give a little extra crunch and flavour to breadcrumb coatings.

To make Thai-style chicken goujons, you will need:

2 chicken breasts
Seasoned flour
1 egg
4 tbsp breadcrumbs
2 tbsp desiccated coconut
2 tbsp olive oil
1 small chilli, diced
1 tsp minced garlic and ginger

Slice the chicken breasts into even sized pieces, about a finger in length. Dip them first in seasoned flour, then beaten egg, and finally the breadcrumbs mixed with the coconut.

Cook on a high shelf at 200C or GM 6. In the meantime, mix the oil, garlic, ginger and chilli together. After 10 to 15 minutes, take out the chicken and pour a small amount of the oil over each piece, then put back in the oven for a further 10 minutes.

Serve with something appropriate - I had mine with a salad of coriander and spring onion.

Well, that's about me exhausted recipe wise, and I've only used half the bag, so suggestions welcome. I don't like it seeing it everytime I open the cupboard, judging me.

You son of a bitch.