Vegan Cake - Attempt #1

So I've been making a lot of cakes recently.

And it's been a lot of fun.

But there has been one minor glitch. My son hasn't been able to eat any of the cakes I've been making.  You see, he has food allergies. Dairy and eggs are included in those allergies. Which completely rules out most traditional cakes and all of the meringue buttercreams I have been making.

I make plenty of things that he can eat, but I have been promising him that I will try to make him a fancy cake, like those he's been watching me make, that is completely safe for him.

Today was the day I decided to go for it.

But apparently the vegan-baking-deities were not on my side.

I started by making my cake layers. I prepared my pans as usual, except that I was trying to save a few minutes, so I skipped using parchment rounds in the bottom of my pans. I sprayed them well and figured I'd be okay.

Mistake #1.

Umm... yeah, the entire bottom of the cakes stuck to the pans.

No problem... I'll try to piece it back together.

Umm... nope. Never mind. Didn't even try that with the second layer. Hmm...

The next step was the vegan meringue buttercream.

Now, meringue buttercream has two main ingredients. Egg whites and butter. Both out when going vegan.  Instead of egg whites, vegan meringue uses aquafaba - the liquid most people dump out from cans of beans (garbanzo, in my case). It takes some time, but it whips up to a light and airy meringue and can be used as an egg replacement in many recipes.  As for the butter, there are plenty of non-dairy butter alternatives. All of the recipes for vegan buttercream that I read recommended either 100% palm-oil shortening or Earth Balance sticks (rather than spread). I couldn't find the shortening in my grocery store, but did find the Earth Balance, so that was what I went with.

To make Italian meringue buttercream, the egg whites (or aquafaba) is whipped to stiff peaks while a sugar and water syrup is cooked to a specific temperature in a pot.

Here is where fail #2 came into play.

Apparently my candy thermometer is broken. And I didn't know it. So while I was waiting for the thermometer to let me know that my sugar syrup had reached 240 degrees, turns out my sugar had way surpassed the soft ball stage that that temperature indicates and... well... yeah. I didn't take pictures of that part. But I had to scrap that sugar, scrub my pot and try again, this time making an educated guess as to the temperature of my syrup, knowing that my thermometer would not be a help.

The second attempt at the meringue seemed to work, so I whipped it all up, added in my "butter" and... had frosting!

Now white-on-white cakes don't necessarily look all that dynamic in photos...

But it came together alright, despite the issues I'd been having...

I mean... it looks like a cake, right?

All unassuming and cake-y?

You can kind of see the uneven layers and what not, but... it's a cake!

And then it was time for dessert.

Both kids started off excited. Both said it was pretty good.

Then, after a few more bites... they both opted to skip dessert.

That's right, my children chose no dessert over this cake.

That is not exactly a promising sign.

I finished both of their pieces. Because... it's still cake. The cake itself was okay - plain, not a lot of flavor, uneven texture... and the buttercream, while smooth and silky like "regular" Italian meringue buttercream, tasted a bit salty and a bit... well, like the Earth Balance spread. The cake and the frosting together taste better than either one component on its own, but even still, it wasn't a hit here.

So today's adventure didn't work out like I'd hoped.

I'll keep trying.

And for my vegan baking needs, I'll stick to this chocolate cake that my family loves. At least until I can find a better layering-cake recipe. I'll also have to play with alternative butter substitutes if I want to try the vegan meringue buttercream again...

Live and learn.

Tweet

Vegan Chocolate Cream Pie

There's been a lot of talk going around the 'net about how some people are making a bigger deal of holidays than they really should. Particularly minor holidays and "made up" holidays. With the popularity of facebook and pinterest and all kinds of other social media "brag" sites, it seems that there are a number of people out there who feel like it's unnecessary pressure and expectations to create big, elaborate celebrations out of every tiny thing.

Me? Any celebration that involves food, you know I'm in. Because why not add a little fun to each day? Especially when it's fun of the delicious variety!

So earlier this month, on March 14th (3/14), it was Pie Day. For us  math nerds. Pie = pi = 3.14 = 3/14. Get it? And... it's an excuse to eat pie!!

I'd originally wanted to have pie for each meal that day. Starting with quiche for breakfast. But little miss doesn't like quiche. And little man can't eat it. And daddy can't have the crust. So I'd have been making 4 totally different quiche-style breakfasts. Umm... never mind. So I decided to concentrate on dinner. We had pizza. Pizza pie. It works, right? Individual pizzas - daddy's with a cauliflower (carb free) crust, little man's dairy free. Easy enough to customize.

Then I got to concentrate on dessert.

I made a dairy free pie crust using coconut oil instead of butter (based on this recipe), then set to planning my fillings. For one pie, I made a Dutch apple pie. Again, dairy free.

But for the second, I wanted something more decadent.  So I decided on chocolate.

I've had my eye on vegan cream pies for a while. Vegan cheesecakes, vegan chocolate cream pies... the recipes all say how totally simple they are. But they all include an ingredient that... well... I've never used before... and that several members of my family who shall remain nameless would not want to try if they knew it was there.

No, it's not those melted chocolate chips I'm showing you. It's what they get blended with in the food processor.

And if you've ever made a vegan pie, you probably know what it is.

Tofu.

Yup - silken tofu. It holds things together, gives the pie body, and takes on the flavor of whatever you put with it. And it's really just that easy.

Blend everything together and pour it in the pre-baked crust!

Then I made the mistake of letting everyone eat it all before taking more photos.

Oops.

But I promise - it was delicious, it sliced up like a dream, and even my tofu-fearing family absolutely loved it! Which is encouraging me to try to make other vegan pies, too!

So tell me - did you celebrate Pie Day?


Coconut Oil Pie Crust
(slightly adapted from Coconut Recipes)

2 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon white sugar
3/4 cup coconut oil
1/4 - 1/2 cup ice cold water

Combine the flour, salt and sugar, then cut in the coconut oil unti lthe mixture resembles coarse sand. You can do this manually (whisk the dry ingredients, use two knives to cut in the coconut oil) or with a food processor. Slowly mix in the ice water, one tablespoon at a time, until the dough holds together (if using food processor, stop as soon as it forms a ball). Divide the dough into two portions, shape each into a disc and wrap with plastic wrap. You can put the dough into the refrigerator if you are not ready to roll it out just yet, but you will need to let it warm up a bit, as the coconut oil firms up in the cold and is difficult to roll out.

To bake the pie crust to prepare to make the pie here, preheat the oven to 425 degrees, take one of the discs of dough, roll it to fit your pie plate (I use a 9-inch pie plate) anad gently fit it in, shaping the edges as you'd like.  Line the pie crust with either parchment paper or aluminum foil and fill with pie weights. You do not need "formal" pie weights - you can use dried beans (though you can't cook them for eating afterwards -I just save them in a baggie and reuse them as pie weights) or I read that you can use un-popped popcorn kernals, which you're supposed to be able to stil pop afterwards! Either way,  make sure you weigh down the crust a bit so that it doesn't puff up while baking. Bake for about 15 minutes (you can peek in - the edges should just start getting golden brown), then carefully remove the parchment/foil with the pie weights and bake for an additional 5 minutes to get the center a bit golden as well.  Cool before filling.

Vegan Chocolate Cream Pie
(from care2.com)

Prepared baked pie crust of choice
2 cups chocolate chips
1 package silken tofu, rinsed and drained
1/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla extract

Melt chocolate chips using your preferred method (mmicrowave, double boiler - whatever you like!). Once the chocolate is melted, combine all of the ingredients in a food processor and process until fully blended and smooth.
Pour filling into prepared (and cooled!) pie crust and place the pie in the refrigerator for at least an hour before serving.

Enjoy!

Tweet

Rugalach

Like most dabbling bakers, I have a mental list of things that I'd really like to try. Some day.  Between the Daring Kitchen, Sourdough Surprises and The Secret Recipe Club, I've been really lucky to have the opportunity to try lots of them, but there are still plenty more I want to try.

For a long time, rugelach has been on that list.  Rugelach is a crescent-style pastry with some sort of filling.  I actually haven't eaten rugelach for years, but I have still wanted to try it.

Last week, I finally had the occasion that called for something special, so decided to tackle this pastry.  What was that occasion? I'd reached the final class on a Groupon I had for a local, awesome Zumba studio. And I wanted to thank both the amazing instructor and the awesome, friendly woman at the front desk. What better way to thank someone than with a tasty treat?

There are many recipes out there for the actual pastry dough for rugelach, ranging from very simple to very complicated. But most that I saw were of the simple variety, with only a few ingredients.  Flour, a touch of salt, maybe some sugar (I used brown sugar) and lots of butter and cream cheese.

These were mixed together in the food processor until they almost form a cohesive dough...

 ...and then I did a quick, final knead to really bring it together. The dough is enough for two sets of pastries, so I divided it up and popped it into the fridge.

Now... there was just one problem.

All that butter and cream cheese. While I was making these treats to share with the lovely folks at the studio, I still wanted to save a few for my family.  But with all that butter and cream cheese, there was no way that little man could eat these.

So I made a quick half-batch just for him. Dough came together exactly the same...

...but with two slight ingredient substitutions.

Okay, so that's not so slight. In place of butter, I used coconut oil, and in place of cream cheese, I used a vegan cream cheese alternative.

It was actually really easy.

The vegan dough went into the fridge right next to the other one, and there they all rested overnight.

The next day, it was time to get rolling.

Literally.

Each disc is rolled out into a circle about 1/8 of an inch thick, then spread with any filling you choose.

My first filling was one that is relatively traditional for rugelach - chocolate and cinnamon sugar.

Once the topping is spread over the dough, simply cut the circle into wedges (I used a pizza cutter - super easy!) and roll each wedge up crescent-roll style.

A quick egg-wash and a sprinkle of cinnamon sugar...

...and these were ready for the oven to turn into flaky deliciousness.

As the first batch baked, I started on the second flavor.  I re-mixed some of the brown sugar-chai masala filling that I'd used for the chai-spiced cinnamon rolls and used that.

And these baked up just as beautifully.

And finally, it was time to roll the vegan dough.  The coconut oil made this dough a little tougher to roll, and it cracked a lot more while I was rolling it, but I was finally able to work it into a thin circle, which I spread with blackberry preserves.

To keep these vegan, I skipped the egg-wash and, instead, brushed these with a bit of coconut milk.  The preserves leaked out more than the other fillings, but other than that, they didn't look too bad.

Now, seeing that this was the first time I'd ever made these, I had to taste them before packaging them up! And I was super happy with the results. Even the vegan version were crisp and flaky.  The chocolate and cinnamon sugar ones were my favorite, but all three had a really nice flavor and were really fun to eat.

So I was super happy to share these to thank the wonderful folks at the Zumba studio. And luckily, they told me that they liked them - so I'd say it worked out pretty well.


Rugelach
(based on allrecipes.com)

2 cups all purpose flour
2 tablespoons brown sugar
a pinch of salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into chunks (vegan alternative: coconut oil)
8 ounces cream cheese, cut into chunks (vegan alternative: vegan cream cheese, such as Tofutti brand)
any filling of your choice (about 1/4 cup filling per portion of dough, more or less to your preference)

Combine flour, sugar and salt in your food processor, pulsing a few times just to combine.
Add chunks of butter and cream cheese slowly, pulsing to combine as you add. Once all of the butter and cream cheese has been added, run the food processor until the dough forms large curds.
Turn the dough out onto a clean work surface and knead it lightly just a few times to bring it together.
Divide the dough into two equal pieces, form each into a disc and wrap each in plastic wrap. Refrigerate dough at least two hours or overnight.
When you are ready to prepare and bake the rugelach, preheat the oven to 375 degrees and remove the dough from the refrigerator.
Roll each section of dough into a circle approximately 1/8 of an inch thick. Spread the dough with the filling of your choice (chopped chocolate, cinnamon sugar, jams - the choices are limitless!). Cut the dough into wedges (a pizza cutter makes this simple). Each circle can make 12-16 wedges.
Roll each wedge, from the wide end toward the tip. Place each rolled piece onto a parchment-lined cookie sheet.
If desired, brush each piece with egg wash (or, for the vegan pastries, coconut milk) and sprinkle them with a touch of cinnamon sugar.
Bake in preheated oven for 20-25 minutes (mine took about 22 minutes).
Transfer pastries to a wire cooling rack and allow to cool a bit before tasting. They will crisp up a bit more as they set.
Enjoy!

Tweet