coconut cake
- noun
- /ˈkoʊkəˌnʌt keɪk/
- It was that coconut cake that she made every Passover, a recipe she got from Mother.
- slice of coconut cake
- make a coconut cake
Examples
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A month later, on our first day back in Annette, my mom arrived at the house we were renting with a hamburger casserole and a coconut cake.
Fiction book (2000) -
For her birthday, she requested a homemade coconut cake topped with sweet cream frosting.
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The point is we're here now eating coconut cake.
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The hotel wanted to offer you some complimentary coconut cake.
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We had this enormous coconut cake.
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Mothers in headscarves and bright lipstick chat and eat coconut cakes.
Blog text (16) -
I put the bean salad and coconut cake I had brought on the table with the rest of the food and made sure that Junior and Dora had full plates to keep them busy.
Fiction book (1994) -
At the party, everyone raved about the delicious coconut cake that was served for dessert.
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The chef's signature dish is a rich coconut cake infused with freshly grated coconut.
Synonyms
A sweet baked food made from flour, sugar, eggs, and fat
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'a cake made with coconut' is directly and compositionally derived from 'coconut' (the coconut flesh) + 'cake' (a sweet baked dessert). This type of noun–noun (or noun + noun) compound is cross-linguistically common and follows regular English compounding patterns, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents can readily infer the meaning.
Etymology
Coconut cake comes from a simple picture: a cake made with shredded coconut mixed into the batter and often spread on top as frosting. That's why the name means a sweet, tropical 'dessert' made with coconut.