Preheat oven to 350 degrees and use palm shortening or butter to grease 2 - 9 inch cake rounds. Trace the bottom of your cake rounds on parchment paper, cut the rounds out, and place the fitted parchment paper rounds on the bottom of your greased cake pans.
In a large mixing bowl, combine oil, sugar, and eggs, and beat for 1 minute.
Add the rest of the ingredients for the cupcakes and mix with beaters until combined.
Divide the batter between the 2 cake pans, and bake for 40 minutes – the cake should “spring” back when you touch it, and a toothpick will come out clean.
Let the cakes cool for 10 minutes before turning out onto cooling racks to cool completely before frosting.
When you are ready to frost, blend about 3/4 of the bag of freeze dried strawberries in a Magic Bullet type blender or coffee grinder until it becomes a fine powder. Set the rest of the freeze dried strawberries aside to crumble on the top of the cake later.
Blend the palm shortening, powdered sugar, freeze dried strawberry powder, coconut milk, and extracts until smooth. You can adjust the coconut milk depending on how thick or thin you like your frosting texture. I had wished I had added a bit more coconut milk to mine this time because it was a bit thicker - the strawberry powder adds another element of dry ingredient that soaks it up.
Crumble the remaining freeze dried strawberries to sprinkle over the top of the cake if you want for decoration!
or raw milk if you can tolerate dairy
or raw milk if you can tolerate dairy
