INTRODUCTION

It is not my intention to issue a vegan cake recipe but I am very interested to know how a cake without eggs and dairy taste like, I therefore proceeded to design a recipe. In addition, most well known major bloggers such as  Jamie Oliver and Taiwanese famous blogger cum writer Ms Carol also have vegan cake recipe not to mention the internet is flooded with such cake recipes target at those paleo diet followers and vegan followers.

In recent years, anything marked “vegan” will command a price premium and I knew it and can be even more expensive than normal cakes. It is not the cake ingredients that are expensive but it is subject to the law of market mechanism: Demand and supply. The supply of vegan cakes is a niche market targeting at niche customers. May be at the present time, the demand exceeds the supply of vegan cakes and therefore pushing the price up…These recipes are usually not as matured as normal cakes recipes and bakeries usually have develop “secret recipes” for their products.

Sorry for not being humble to say that to design a normal cake recipe is definitely not a problem for me. But I have to think twice when I am issuing this egg free and dairy free recipe.  One cannot simply assume that since there is no egg, just replaced the egg volume with equivalent quantity of liquid. Wait, it does not work this way. In normal cakes, eggs assumed few important roles. Not only it is a flavouring agent, it is an important binding agent binding the flour molecules and hence improves on the texture of the cakes. Without eggs, there is a tendency to have problems with the cake texture. It is delicious but it may come with a lot of debris. As for butter, it is not a problem at all as there are many alternatives ranges from margarine to coconut oil or other liquid oil. Milk can be safely be substituted with water or soya bean milk or even almond milk.

As for eggs, there are a few ways to substitute the eggs that I read from internet:

• Energ-G-Egg replacer  which is a commercial E replacer powder with ingredients comprises of a variety of starches and it was commonly used in commercial cakes
• Aquafaba  which is the cooking liquid of beans and other legumes like chickpeas. If you buy the canned chickpeas or kacang putih, the beans are soaked in some whitish liquids and vegan bakers used that to replace meringue and it seems that the outcome are encouraging. It is the trendiest and is touted as the future star of vegan cooking
• Chia seeds, the trendy health ingredients  that are able to expand in water and provide some slightly sticky liquid and hence bind the flour molecules
• Tapioca flour or other starches. Asian shall not be unfamiliar with these starches that turned sticky and able to bind other flours together
• Tofu were mashed and  added to cake as a binding agent
• Fruit purees such as apple puree or banana puree seems to be common to help the binding cake
• Oats and cereals that have a sticky property when water was added.

For this recipe, I have selected Nestum cereal as a binding agent because I like the cereal aroma. Personally, i find that may be some tapioca starch still need to be added to enhance further binding.

If you Google vegan recipe, mostly chocolate cakes will be on top of the list. The reason is very simple, chocolate is a powerful flavouring agent, it is therefore one of the most suitable agent for vegan cakes that do not have any eggs or butter aroma.   It is for this reason that I have selected chocolate cake for this recipe.  Of course, other that can be considered are matcha, peanut butter or even coffee cake that also have strong natural fragrance.

I think many are interested to know is this cake delicious? I will try to answer this question as objectively as I can. If you are vegan and you have not touched eggs and dairy products for a long time, I will consider this as a delicious moist chocolaty cake.

If you are not a vegetarian and you want to try this cake for your very own reasons or even just for fun since it is trendy, I will advise you not to try this recipe as vegan cakes taste very differently from normal cakes. You may not have noticed the importance of egg and butter aroma in normal cakes as you assumed that it was being masked by the chocolate flavour, but I can tell you that you may not be able to enjoy cakes that lack these 2 aromas unless you are psychologically prepare for it. I personally found that it is rather strange to answer in this manner as I am issuing this recipe but I want to be frank with readers and think twice before you proceed.

This is my very own recipe and I always design cake recipe from the very basic pound cake recipe and amend the recipe along the way. One of my prime concerns about the cake  is its moistness. I want my cake to be moist and therefore this cake is moist. For this cake, the aroma solely depends on the cocoa powder you used. Therefore, do use some better cocoa powder for better flavour. All other ingredients are tasteless and unlike normal cakes, they cannot negate your less than satisfactory cocoa aroma if the powder you used is not fragrant.

WHAT IS REQUIRED

Servings: Prepare a 6 inches diameter small cake

Chocolate cake

• 150 grams of self raising flour
• 150 grams of brown sugar
• 135 grams of cooking oil
• 165 grams of water or almond milk or soya milk
• 50 grams of cocoa powder
• 50 grams of baby cereal or instant oats
• 2 tablespoons of tapioca starch
• 2 tablespoons of instant coffee powder
• 1 tablespoon of vanilla extract (optional)
• 1 tablespoon of vinegar

Chocolate frosting

• 150 grams of pure dark chocolate
• 50 grams of margarine
• 50 grams of soya bean milk or almond milk

STEPS OF PREPARATION

• Pre-heat the oven to 170 degree Celsius and lightly grease a 6 cm baking tin. If preferred, put a piece of baking paper at the bottom of baking tin.

• In a bowl, put the tapioca starch, self raising flour, baby cereal, instant coffee powder, brown sugar and cocoa powder. Stir until well mixed. Set aside.

• Put the vanilla extra, vinegar, cooking oil, water or almond milk, stir until well combined and set aside.

• Make a well in the centre of the flour, pour in the wet ingredients slowly. Use a whisk and fold it until well combined. Transfer to a lightly greased baking tin and bake in the preheated oven of 170 degree Celsius for about 40 minutes or  until a skewer inserts in the centre of the cake comes out clean.

• Cool completely before transferring out from the baking tin for frosting.

• Put all the frosting ingredients into a microwavable bowl, microwave for 3-5 minutes. Stir the ingredients using a whisk and whisk until smooth. If you do not have a microwave, heat up a small pot of hot water, place the bowl on top of the pot and use the steam heat to melt the chocolate and margarine.

• Frost the cooled chocolate cake when the cake cooled down completely. For firmer frosting, chilled for 1/2 hour before frosting.

CONCLUSION

I do not intend to promote this recipe though vegan is considered as trendy nowadays. I am issuing this post because I want to share with readers about my adventure and possibly some vegetarian readers may be need it.  I will not say that this is the best recipe but it can become a reference point for those who are into vegan baking that suits some trendy diet..

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