Vegan chocolate cake decorated with homemade simple candy for Halloween…
Recently I’ve been really interested in vegan baking, it’s an interesting challenge having to substitute animal based ingredients with plant based ingredients without sacrificing the taste and making sure that the bake is still fluffy and perfect.
So for Halloween I decided to bake a chocolate cake, frost it with fudgey chocolate frosting and decorate with homemade pumpkin shaped candy. And here I am sharing with you my favorite vegan chocolate cake recipe!
BAKING A VEGAN CHOCOLATE CAKE
I have always baked cakes using eggs and milk, because this is what I have learned to do from my mother and probably the most common recipe to bake any cake. However, I found that baking a vegan cake is also very easy and can be made with very simple ingredients. My worry was that the cake won’t rise without using eggs, but if you add baking soda with vinegar that will make sure that the cake rises nicely and turns out fluffy.
HOW TO MAKE VEGAN FUDGY CHOCOLATE FROSTING
To make a rich, decadent and delicious buttercream frosting vegan, it does not mean that it has to be made with dairy. It’s still called buttercream but made without any dairy butter, and it’s ridiculously delicious! For the best vegan buttercream, I found that using coconut shortening results in a very tasty frosting and vegan butter works great as well. The reason why I like to use coconut shortening and not coconut oil, is because the frosting will not melt and turn into liquid at 24 degrees. So if you use coconut shortening, you won’t have to worry about things getting messy if you’re serving the cake in a warm room.
So to make the vegan buttercream frosting, I use coconut shortening, powdered sugar, coconut milk and vanilla extract to taste.
Below is the recipe for the vegan chocolate cake and the buttercream frosting.
Vegan Chocolate Cake with Buttercream Frosting
Ingredients
For the cake:
- 200 grams all purpose flour
- 150 grams granulated sugar
- 4 tbsp cacao powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp white vinegar
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- 250 ml water
- 4 tbsp coconut oil
For the buttercream frosting:
- 450 grams powdered sugar
- 100 grams cacao powder
- 100 grams coconut shortening or vegan butter
- 125 ml coconut milk
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
Instructions
To make the cake:
- Preheat oven to 180c degrees. And grease 2 x 16cm cake baking tins.
- In a medium sized bowl, sift together all dry ingredients.
- Add vinegar and coconut oil, and give it a good mix.
- Add water, and mix again but make sure not to overmix the mixture.
- Pour mixture into your prepared greased baking tins, and bake until a toothpick comes out clean from the centre of the cake.
- Take the cakes out of the oven, and let them cool down on a cooling rack until they’re ready to be frosted.
To make the buttercream frosting:
- Add powdered sugar, cacao powder, coconut shortening or vegan butter, coconut milk and vanilla extract to a mixing bowl and using a hand mixer beat until it’s creamy and smooth.
- If you need to thin out the buttercream frosting, you can add 1 tbsp of milk and mix again.
- Frost the cake with the buttercream and serve,
Notes
Nutrition
Rich Tyler
This looks super duper yummy, love cake!
Adrian Bold
This looks like a gorgeous cake! I wish I had time to practice my baking.
Mary Hill
That looks delightful and vegan to bet tastes amazing to! Decorated with absolute perfection those candy pumpkins are just amazing! So talented i’ll makd a cuppa you provide the cake ????
Ren Taylor
Looks yummy what a great recipe….thank you for this
Chrissy Harris
Lovely post and beautiful photos. I would love to be able to make a cake that looks as good as this
Jeanette Leighton
This looks lovely I’m a big cake lover yummy
Brandon
These mummy brownies are sooo cute!
Michelle Stokes
As I’m always on the lookout for something tasty to make for my vegan daughter I must give this a go.
Victoria Easton
This looks really tasty – mine would never look like that!
Catherine Whetton
Looking forward to trying this for my vegan friends
Miss Tracy Hanson
That looks absolutely delicious. 🙂 Only just thought about vegan recipes but more I read about them the more I want to try some. 🙂 If my results are half as good, I’ll be over the moon.
Adrian Bold
This looks delicious! I wish I had the motivation and time to bake things like this.
Rachael Sexey
I will definitely be making this as we are all trying to reduce our dairy and sugar jntake
Traci @ The Kitchen Girl
Looks like my new go-to for the perfect vegan cake. I love your informative post with tips and tricks for best results. I’ll be sharing this everywhere 🙂
sue | theviewfromgreatisland
This is just adorable, I love making my own candy and I can’t wait to try these cute little pumpkins!
Tina
Therma Pen is the best. I like the instant read and how easy it is to use. I first fell for this product when seeing it on ATK. Lovely cake recipe, you had me at chocolate:)
Brandi
Your photos are gorgeous. This looks so good. I need a piece of this!
Julia
Those candy pumpkins are so cute!
Tara
Such a beautiful autumn cake! I love how you made the pumpkin hard candy for the top. So cute!
Tina | The Worktop
Looks tasty! I’d love a slice of that.
Ellen
What a delightful cake. I adore the decorations!
Ben Myhre
A thermpen has been on my wishlist for a while now. Maybe this XMAS I will get it! 🙂
jane @ littlesugarsnaps
I’ve been having the same thoughts about extending my baking repertoire to take specialist diets into account more. I have set myself all sorts of challenges, so reading your post today has served to inpsire me further. I will ensure I go nowhere near coconut oil when it comes to making the buttercream though – kind of obvious now you’ve pointed it out. Your buttercream looks amazing.