VEGAN CAKES

By popular demand, here are the two vegan cake recipes I used when making my daughter’s first birthday cakes!

For Bridget’s actual birthday, it was on my heart that I wanted her first cake to be made with love by mama. They will forever hold a special place in my heart. I’ll always cherish my memories baking them from scratch (even the icing)!

In classic Jacqui fashion, I wanted to go above and beyond by making two completely separate two-tier cakes with two completely separate frostings. One was Bridget’s smash cake (vanilla) that she loved and devoured, and the other (lemon) was for the adults (our immediate family members that came over to sing to her and shower her with love and celebration). I will say though, after Miss Bridget went to town and ate what seemed to be a ton of cake with no end in sight, we made her stop and the parents, grandparents and great-grandparents got to sneak some bites 🙂

Both of these cakes are approved by my taste buds, in addition to 10 of our family members (who wouldn’t sugar coat, pun intended, how these tasted)! We all were beyond pleasantly shocked with how absolutely delicious and sophisticated tasting they were! They were light, fluffy, and full of flavor. I know lots of people are turned off by this word, but I’m sorry, I have to use it as a huge plus here – they are extremely moist cakes. I can’t say enough pleasant things about them.

If you bake them, I’d love to hear your happy memories with them!

Enjoy!

VEGAN VANILLA CAKE

Ingredients for cake

1 & 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup white sugar
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup non-dairy milk (I used Ripple vanilla pea-protein milk. You can read about my personal obsession with it here.)
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/3 cup EVOO
1 tbsp apple cider vinegar

*make sure you have parchment paper at home as well as two 6″ or 7″ cake rounds.

ingredients for frosting

3 & 3/4 cup powdered sugar
3 tbsp vegan butter (I used Earth Balance soy-free buttery spread)
4 tbsp non-dairy milk (as stated above, I used Ripple vanilla pea-protein milk.)
2 tsp vanilla extract

instructions

preheat oven to 350 degrees F
Pour flour, sugar, baking soda & salt into a bowl and mix together
add milk, vanilla, oil, and vinegar and whisk by hand until combined
Grease two 6″ or 7″ round cake tins and cut parchment paper into circles to fit, then line the bottoms
divide the batter evenly between the two rounds
bake for 30 min.
make sure they are cooked before removing (you can confirm with the classic toothpick or fork trick)
let cakes cool completely
while they are cooling, make frosting
add powdered sugar, vegan butter, vanilla and half of the milk
if your frosting is a little thin, add more powdered sugar. If it’s a little thick, add more milk.
when your cakes are completely cooled, add frosting on top of one of the layers and then add the next tier on top. Then coat the entire cake with the frosting and decorate as you please.

VEGAN LEMON CAKE

ingredients for cake

2 & 1/2 cups + 2 tbsp all-purpose flour
1 & 1/2 cups white sugar
1 & 1/2 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
1 & 1/2 cups non-dairy milk (I used Ripple vanilla pea-protein milk. You can read about my personal obsession with it here.)
1/2 cup EVOO
1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1 tsp vanilla extract
3 tsp lemon extract
2 tbsp lemon zest

*make sure you have parchment paper at home as well as two 6″ or 7″ cake rounds.

ingredients for frosting

4 & 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1/2 cup vegan butter (I used Earth Balance soy-free buttery spread)
2 tsp lemon extract
3 & 1/2 tbsp lemon juice
non-dairy milk to thin it out if needed

instructions

preheat oven to 350 degrees F
grease two 6″ or 7″ round cake tins and cut parchment paper into circles to fit, then line the bottoms
mix flour, sugar, baking soda and salt.
then add milk, oil, vinegar, vanilla, lemon extract and lemon zest.
Whisk by hand. Don’t overmix. Tiny lumps are ok.
divide batter evenly between both pans.
bake for 30 min.
make sure they are cooked before removing (you can confirm with the classic toothpick or fork trick)
let cakes cool completely
while they cool make frosting
place powdered sugar, vegan butter, lemon extract and lemon juice into a bowl. If it needs to be more thick, add powdered sugar. If it needs to be more thin, add non-dairy milk.
when your cakes are completely cooled, add frosting on top of one of the layers and then add the next tier on top. Then coat the entire cake with the frosting and decorate as you please. (You can zest lemon on the top to add an extra flare. But don’t worry, it already tastes plenty lemony without the addition).