"Light*" Coconut Torte

The Idea:
Faced with the reality of how many calories a real torte has, I searched my mental recipe book for light torte ideas. The frosting packs ALOT of calories, so finally trying out Italian meringue frosting was the way to go. Cooking Light happened to post a beautiful picture of a Fresh Coconut cake a little while ago on Facebook, so I thought I would give it a try for a Sunday BBQ we were having. The Recipe: Fresh Coconut Cake online at MyRecipes (from Cooking Light magazine)

Alterations: I had no water in the 3 coconuts I bought, so I used coconut milk. I don't think that this was the reason the cake came out a bit dense. I also added an extra egg white to my frosting, because I incorrectly thought I would not have enough.

Lessons Learned:
-Italian meringue is prepared with hot syrup poured into egg whites, vs. Swiss meringue which is baked. I think that is right. This is more of a clarification for me because I have seen these two distinctions repeatedly lately.
-While I was sceptical of the frosting at first, the second day (or after completely cooling in the refridgerator) the frosting was very good, but deflated a bit. When I first put it on it was a massive layer. So it will deflate.
-That said, the frosting in between the cake will also virtually disappear, so it is important to "dam" the frosting between layers with a heavier frostin or something so it does not squish out. Duh- this was a lesson learned from a torte a while ago.
-Egg whites are a tricky thing. I really have to be careful of overbeating, because I think I overbeat them this time and they were not so easy to fold into the batter.
-Must find cake flour. I use the 3/4c flour +2Tbsp. corn starch substitution for 1c cake flour currently because I do not know where and if I can find cake flour in this country. This is probably making my cakes too dense.
-Finally this recipe is delicious and I will be repeating it again. The toasted coconut gave such a rich buttery flavor to the cake. YUM. All reviews were very good. Sadly I found out one guest was actually allergic to coconut! But yay! more for me....

What's Next:
A friend alerted me that there is a national torte competition on Sunday in honor of Mother's Day. So I entered. We will see! Criteria: 20 eggs and must include butter. Egs and butter no problem, but 20 eggs?? We will see. There may be some marzipan sculpting involved in my idea!

*- Light= 332 cal per serving, 10.8g fat. Not too bad for a torte, except it just made me want a bigger piece of this delicious torte!