Vegan Chocolate Avocado Cake (serves 8)

November 6, 2016January 22, 20182 Comments

Vegan Chocolate Avocado Cake by The Fat Foodie

My partner recently tasked me with producing a vegan chocolate avocado cake just because it looked intriguing and never being someone who shirks from a challenge, I decided to give it a go. This vegan cake mix uses avocados (and a small amount of coconut oil) in place of butter. As someone who worships at the altar of butter, I was pretty sceptical as to whether this chocolate avocado cake would turn out to be remotely tasty, but by God, I was wrong!

Without the addition of butter I was convinced that the vegan chocolate avocado cake would be dry and dense, but the chocolatey sponge cake emerged from the oven with a beautifully light and delicate crumb, while also being very moist and fudgy. The cake is sandwiched and covered in a very simple chocolate cream made from avocados, cocoa and icing sugar, and although I could taste the avocados in the frosting, in my opinion it only lent the cake a light, fresh flavour as opposed to making it taste as though it contained vegetables.

This vegan chocolate avocado cake kept in the fridge for a good four or five days (under cling film) and even by its final day in this world it had not lost any of its moist texture. Although the original recipe did not call for any decoration I’m pleased I included walnuts on the top of the cake because they added a nice crunch to the cake’s texture and a lovely nutty flavour which complemented the avocado icing.

The Gorgeous Colour Palette of Mashed Avocado and Cocoa

If I could offer one tip when it comes to making this cake it’d be that you have to use really ripe avocados because they need to blend well with the other ingredients, for both the cake mix and the icing. One of my so-called ‘ready and ripe’ Marks and Spencer’s avocados was nowhere near ripe and I had to pick bits of hard lurid green fruit out of my cocoa icing which was pretty annoying. However, all in all, I’ll definitely make this incredibly flavoursome cake at some point again.

Ingredients:

For the cake:

3 cups of gluten-free flour (I use Dove’s Farm G/F flour because it’s made with low FODMAP ingredients whereas many other gluten-free flours are made with high FODMAP options.)

40g cocoa powder

2 tsps. baking powder

2 tsps. bicarbonate of soda

½ tsp of salt

¼ cup of melted coconut oil

60g ripe avocado (mashed)

2 cups of water

2 tbsps. white vinegar

2 tsps. vanilla extract

2 cups sugar

For the icing:

100g ripe avocado (mashed)

2 cups icing sugar

24g of cocoa powder

50g of walnut halves (to decorate)

Method:

To make the cake:

Preheat your oven to 180°C/160°C Fan/350°F/Gas mark 4.

Grease or line with greaseproof paper two 9 inch cake tins.

Put all of your cake ingredients (except the baking powder, bicarb, water and vinegar) in a large mixing bowl.

Add the baking powder, bicarb, water and vinegar and whisk until all of your ingredients are combined.

Pour the cake batter evenly into the two cake tins and put in the oven.

Bake for at least 30 mins or until a skewer poked into the middle of the cakes comes out clean.

Leave to cool.

Freshly Baked Vegan Chocolate Avocado Cakes by The Fat Foodie

To make the icing:

Put your avocado, icing sugar and cocoa powder in a bowl and whisk together. (I added a little dash of water because I felt the icing was a little bit too thick.)

Once your cakes are cool, use some of your icing to sandwich your cakes together and then put the rest on the top of the cake and (if you have enough left over) ice the sides of the cake. (I just made my cake so it had a generous amount of icing on the top.)

Top with walnuts if you fancy and serve.

Vegan Chocolate Avocado Cake by The Fat Foodie

Save

Save

Save

Orange and White Chocolate Pavlova (serves 10-12)

October 26, 2016August 4, 2018Leave a comment

Orange and White Chocolate Pavlova by The Fat Foodie

This orange and white chocolate pavlova is one of the easiest desserts you could ever make and I’ll bet it’s one that’ll be eaten the quickest too. I don’t know about your house, but few sweet things are demolished faster in our household than a pavlova, particularly one which merges a good zesty fruit with sweet sugary shards of meringue and rich, lightly whipped cream.

The combination of creamy orange curd spread over layers of thick meringue which is crisp, but still just slightly chewy, and sandwiched by silky whipped cream is a great marriage altogether. Although I’ve used orange in my curd you could easily opt to use lemon, lime or even passionfruit instead and any of them would give you a great result.

As this was made as a treat for my family I didn’t make it a dairy-free version, but if you can’t tolerate dairy you could easily adapt the recipe by using non-dairy versions of the ingredients such as oat cream, coconut cream, non-dairy butter and dark chocolate instead of white chocolate.

Orange and White Chocolate Pavlova by The Fat Foodie

As easy as this orange and white chocolate pavlova is to make there are just a few small, but important, rules you must follow in order to get the best results:

1.) Don’t get any fat in the egg whites. Egg whites will not whisk properly if there is any fat in them whatsoever, so crack each of your eggs into a small bowl before tipping the egg whites one at a time into the bowl you’ll be whisking them up in. That way if you accidentally break an egg yolk you’re only throwing away one egg rather than the whole bowlful. Also, make sure your bowl and electric whisk beaters are spotlessly clean of any residual fats.

2.) Use room temperature eggs as they will be much more voluminous than fridge-cold ones.

3.) Use caster sugar. The egg white bubbles are so delicate that they’ll break more easily if they’re in contact with large pieces of granulated sugar. Therefore, using the smaller sized caster sugar granules will help to retain as much air within the egg whites as possible.

4.) Add a little cornflour to stabilise the egg whites and to create a slightly chewy texture to your meringue.

I made my meringues the night before I was intending to make the pavlova which meant that they could cool down slowly in the oven overnight, ensuring their crust did not crack very much, but you could just use them immediately once they’ve been cooked and have cooled down. Trust me, if you follow these tips you’ll be rewarded with beautiful, big meringues that’ll be just begging to be topped with whipped cream and an assortment of fruits.

Ingredients:

For the meringues:

6 egg whites

375g caster sugar

2 tsps cornflour

For the orange curd:

1 large orange

The zest and juice of 1 orange

6 egg yolks

150g butter (or a non-dairy version)

225g caster sugar

For decoration:

A carton of lactose-free double cream (about 284ml) or a non-dairy version

100g white chocolate (you could use dark chocolate if you prefer)

Method:

Preheat your oven to 180C/160C Fan/350F/Gas mark 4.

Put greaseproof paper on two large baking sheets.

Separate 6 eggs and put the egg whites in a large mixing bowl. Whisk until firm and then whisk in the cornflour and sugar.

Spread three equal circles of meringue mixture onto the baking sheets.

Put in the oven and then turn the oven down to 150C/130C Fan/300F/ Gas mark 2. Bake for 1 hour and then leave the meringues to cool.

To make the curd:

Put all of the curd ingredients into a small saucepan and over a low heat gently whisk it together until it is hot and the curd leaves a thick coat on the back of a spoon dipped into it.

Strain it through a sieve into a bowl and leave it to cool.

To assemble the pavlova:

Break your white chocolate into small pieces and place in a bowl. Leave the chocolate to melt by putting this bowl into a larger one filled with hot water. (Make sure no water gets into the chocolate though, otherwise it’ll seize and will be unworkable.)

Whip the double cream.

Put the first meringue on a serving plate and spread it with the cooled orange curd and then a layer of double cream.

Put the second meringue on top and put the rest of the curd on it, followed by another layer of cream (reserving a little cream for the top).

Put the top meringue on and spread with the last of the cream.

Put the melted white chocolate into a piping bag and drizzle over the top of the pavlova. You could just use a spoon to drizzle it over the cake though if you don’t have a piping bag.

Serve with aplomb to the astonishment and adoration of those around your dinner table and be prepared for people to come back for seconds or even thirds.

Orange and White Chocolate Pavlova by The Fat Foodie

Save

Save

Save

Coconut and Lemon Cupcakes (makes 12-16)

October 12, 2016December 1, 2017Leave a comment

Coconut and Lemon Cupcakes by The Fat Foodie

Ever since I’ve been cooking with coconut oil I’ve wondered what it would be like used in a cake instead of butter. I feared that it would make the sponge heavy, but it actually works really well and gives the cake a light texture while retaining its moisture. Coconut oil tastes quite strongly of coconut though, so I knew it’d have to be a cake which used coconut as one of its main flavour profiles. I figured incorporating lemon zest would work well with it and it does, creating feather-light, fruity, fluffy coconut and lemon cupcakes. (And if you’re feeling particularly self-indulgent, two cupcakes is a low FODMAP portion.)

This coconut and lemon cupcake cake mix is one of those brilliant ‘chuck all of the ingredients into a big bowl and whisk’ mixes, taking next to no time at all to prepare and with the aid of an electric whisk it’s easy to whip up a light and tasty buttercream with which to top the cakes. The real difficulty lies in stopping yourself from eating more than one at a time. Well, maybe two…

Ingredients:

140g coconut oil (melted, but not hot)

200g sugar

2 tbsps lemon juice

2 eggs

a pinch of salt

120ml rice milk

4 tbsps dessicated coconut

The grated zest of 1 lemon

1 tsp coconut essence

200g gluten-free self-raising flour (I use Dove’s Farm G/F flour because it’s made with low FODMAP ingredients whereas many other gluten-free flours are made with high FODMAP options.)

1 tsp baking powder

For the buttercream icing:

70g soft non-dairy butter

1 1/2 tsps vanilla extract

180g icing sugar

1 tbsp lemon juice

3 tbsps of desiccated coconut (for decoration)

Method:

Preheat your oven to 180°C/160°C Fan/Gas 4.

Place your empty cupcake cases in a cupcake tray or, if you don’t have one, just on a flat tray.

With the exception of the flour and baking powder, put all of your ingredients into a large mixing bowl and whisk together.

Add the flour and baking powder and whisk. (Gluten-free flour can be really absorbent, so add a couple of tbsps more rice milk, if necessary.)

Spoon the cake mix into the cupcake cases, but don’t overfill them. (I normally fill them to roughly halfway.)

Bake them in the oven for 12-15 mins until they’re golden brown. You can tell they’re cooked when a skewer pushed into the centre comes out completely clean. Leave to cool on a cooling rack.

Put all of the buttercream icing ingredients in a bowl and whisk together until the icing is pale and fluffy.

When the cakes are cool top each one with a dollop of the buttercream icing and sprinkle with desiccated coconut.

Coconut and Lemon Cupcakes by The Fat Foodie

Coconut and Lemon Cupcakes by The Fat Foodie

Save

Hummingbird Cake (serves 8-10)

September 28, 2016January 22, 2018Leave a comment

Hummingbird Cake by The Fat Foodie

My Canadian aunt recently tagged me in a Southern Living recipe video on Facebook which demonstrated how to make a hummingbird cake and I have been tempted to bake it ever since. (You’ll find the video at the bottom of this post.) A few days ago I went down to my Mum’s house for breakfast and we had been talking about how her summer plants were starting to die back, with only a few bedding plants still alive here and there, so I decided to steal some of the remaining blooms to decorate a cake in celebration of her garden this summer. (*For a list of edible British flowers see below.) The cake I eventually decided to grace with the thoughtfully-picked flowers was the hummingbird cake.

I find that a lot of American recipes fail to work well for me and I attribute this to the fact that instead of using precise measurements they only work on the cup system. That’s fine, but good baking is dependent upon a chemical reaction taking place within the mixture as it cooks and, like any chemistry, if your quantities are inaccurate then you won’t be able to produce the correct result.

I made the hummingbird cake exactly as the recipe stipulated and everyone who tasted it (about eight people) really enjoyed it. However, I must admit that I personally found it a bit heavy. The frosting’s to die for, it tastes exactly like really good vanilla ice-cream, but the cake itself was just a bit too dense for my tastes. Although, that ratio works out at 8 who enjoyed it to 1 who didn’t, so maybe it’s my taste buds which are wrong.

If I were to make it again I would put less fruit in to try to make it lighter or I’d keep the fruit but add a more generous amount of baking powder. Don’t get me wrong, this recipe makes a beautifully moist hummingbird cake which tastes like a really good banana and pecan loaf, but give it a go yourself and see what you think. After all, eight people can’t be wrong.

Hummingbird Cake by The Fat Foodie

Ingredients:

For the cake:

120g of crushed fresh pineapple

2 cups of chopped firm bananas

100g of chopped pecans

3 cups of gluten-free self-raising flour (I use Dove’s Farm G/F flour because it’s made with low FODMAP ingredients whereas many other gluten-free flours are made with high FODMAP options.)

1 ½ cups of vegetable oil

2 cups of sugar

1 tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp ground cinnamon

3 large eggs

1 ½ tsps. vanilla extract

For the icing:

225g (8oz) lactose-free soft cream cheese (or a non-dairy version)

1 cup of soft butter (or non-dairy)

450g (16oz) of icing sugar

2 tsps. vanilla extract

To decorate:

Edible flower heads you’ve shamelessly plundered from your Mum’s garden. (*For a list of edible British flowers see below.)

Method:

This is one of those ‘chuck all the ingredients into a bowl and whisk it all together’ cakes. (I love those ones, don’t you?)

Preheat your oven to 180°C/160°C Fan/350°F/gas mark 4.

This recipe makes quite a big cake so you’ll need to line three baking tins with greaseproof paper. (You could just use two large tins if you don’t have three that are the same size, but you’ll need to cook the cakes for longer.)

Prepare your ingredients as directed.

Put all of your wet ingredients into a large mixing bowl, including the fruit.

Add your dry ingredients and whisk together.

Pour into the baking tins and put in the oven.

Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until a skewer pushed into the middle of the cakes comes out clean.

Leave to cool completely on a cooling rack.

While they are cooling make your icing by putting all of the icing ingredients together in a big bowl and whisking together until it’s light and fluffy.

Once your cakes are cool sandwich them together with some of the icing and then use the rest to ice the top and (if you’ve enough left over) the sides.

Decorate the cake with whole pecans or flowers*.

(*Here is a list of edible British flowers. I only used my flowers to decorate the cake, I picked them off afterwards and we ate the cake without them. If you choose to consume these plants and their flowers you do so entirely at your own risk, so unless you’re absolutely sure about what you’re picking then don’t eat them. You can find a very good list of edible flowers and instructions on what parts of the plants you can eat from Thompson and Morgan here.

Edible flowers: Alpine pinks; Apple blossom; Basil flowers; Begonia; Bergamot; Borage flowers; Broccoli flowers; Busy Lizzie; Carnation, Dianthus and Pinks; Catmint; Chicory; Chive blossoms; Clover; Coriander flowers; Cornflower; Courgette or Marrow flowers; Daisy; Dill flowers; Elderflower; Evening Primrose; Fennel flowers; Fuchsia; Scented Geraniums; Gladiolus; Hibiscus; Hollyhock; Hyssop; Kale flowers; Lavender; Lemon Balm flowers; Lilac; Mint leaves and flowers; Nasturtium; Marigold; Oregano flowers; Garden Vegetable Pea flowers, but not sweet pea flowers because they are toxic; Primrose, Cowslip and Primula; Rose; Rosemary flowers; Runner Bean; Pansies; Pumpkin and Squash flowers; Rocket flowers; Roses; Sage flowers; Strawberry flowers; Sunflower; Sweet violet; Tulips; Viola.)

Save

Hummingbird Cake by The Fat Foodie

Save

Save

The Fat Foodie

Making Low FODMAP Food Good!

Tag: #bakealong

Vegan Chocolate Avocado Cake (serves 8)

Orange and White Chocolate Pavlova (serves 10-12)

Coconut and Lemon Cupcakes (makes 12-16)

Hummingbird Cake (serves 8-10)