"Barbarian Coffee Cake"

 

This recipe is based on my grandmother's Barvarian Coffee Cake recipe which had a LOT more sugar, fat and refined flour.  I've veganized it and made it a vehicle for lots of fruit!

I doubled this recipe so that I could do apricot & plum - and put them in the same pan.  I also added some pitted cherries because - why not? You can use any fruit -- you can put applesauce in the batter and put a (strained) can of pineapple or canned cherries on top. 

Bowl 1 - Sift together

• 1 c whole wheat flour or whole wheat pastry flour
• 3/4 c almond flour 
• 1/2 c white flour (optional if you are using whole wheat pastry flour0
• 1.5 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• pinch of salt

Bowl 2 - wet

• 1/2 c sugar (I used turbinado but sucanat would be good, too - I like the molasses flavor)
• 
  ~1 c fruit purée
• 1/2 c melted coconut oil or neutral oil / vegan butter
• 1 Tb almond extract
• 1 tsp vanillazest and juice of 1/2 lemon
• water or plant based milk as needed

Thoroughly blend each bowl then add wet to dry.

Plum was processed through the Vittorio food mill which results in a much messier process in the kitchen but plum skins don’t shred very well in the blender in my experience.

I processed the apricots in the blender to make the purée.

The batter should be really thick but not so stiff that you can’t mix it so add liquid to loosen it up.

As you can see I did apricot and plum. 

I used 2 part tart pans, so I don’t want the batter to be so thin that it’s going to leak out the bottom.

Bake at 350 for 30-40 min - wooden toothpick inserted near the center should come out clean. Glaze with melted jelly - In this case I used leftover apricot syrup from the process of making glacee apricots.

Be careful to not overfill your cake pan -- once the baking powder/soda start working, you may have a bit of spillover.  Put a cookie sheet below your cake if you are concerned about overflow. 

 

A Tale of Two Lemon Cakes

As a special treat for a wine tasting trip with Matt, Aaron, Selina, Z-man, Richie - I made up two cakes - done with lemon instead of orange as specified:

Olive Oil Rosemary Semolina cake


Fran Costigan's Orange Almond Olive Oil Cake

The first cake required that the batter proof - it wanted yeast and I found myself up late late at night before I was supposed to be getting in the limo with my friends!  It had a drier, bouncier crumb - downright springy.

The second cake just came out perfectly the first time - it was very moist and dense.  Subsequent attempts to make it find it to be  - terribly fickle - and it just collapeses into a globby heap (not sure if it is because I tried using key lime juice instead of orange or lemon and if there is a difference).

And, of course - I made chocolate peanut butter cups, for which Matthew nearly murdered Aaron (who also enjoyed them).

Candy Cap Blondies

Last month, after signing up for the culinary interest group for the Mycological Society of San Francisco, I found myself volunteering to help make desserts for the annual holiday dinner. The organizer and her other volunteer both live within a few blocks of me, so meetings were convened and e-mails flew back and forth.  In the end, I brought a pile of delicious vegan desserts including: Mexican Chocolate Torte, Persimmon Bread Pudding with a Bourbon Anglaise sauce and  Candy Cap Blondies using a recipe created by Eric Tucker for one of his classes at Millennium Restaurant (recipe below). 

The dinner came off pretty smoothly - my friend Scott joined me and even loaned a hand (& tools) to help set up the xmas tree and set tables.  There was so much food!  We could have easily had more people there - and the East Bay location at the Albany Community Center had a fantastic kitchen and huge dining room.  The chanterelle-quinoa stuffed portobello mushroom was really delicious, as were the mashed potatoes with *vegan* mushroom gravy and a delicious mushroom soup with loads of delicious mushrooms.  My desserts partner made up about 20 different kinds of chocolate truffles, mini eclairs and cream puffs.  Needless to say - I was very well fed and brought home much of my dinner for lunch the next day. 

I am still eating some leftover desserts this week, as well - I hope you'll pop in for coffee and cake!

Eric's Millennium Candy Cap Blondies

INGREDIENTS:

• 1/4 c cocoa butter
• 1/3 c grapeseed oil
• 2 T ground dry candy cap mushrooms
• 1/4 c rice or almond milk
• 1 t vanilla extract

• 1 c brown sugar
• 1 1/2 c all purpose flour
• 1 1/4 t baking powder
• 1 t Ener-G egg replacer
• 1/4 t salt
• 1/2 t ground cinnamon
• 1/4 t ground nutmeg
• 1/4 t ground allspice
• 1/4 t ground clove
• 1/2 c pecans, lightly toasted and roughly chopped
• 1/2 c chocolate chips

DIRECTIONS

1. Place the first 5 ingredients into a double boiler and melt.  Remove from heat and let steep for 20 minutes or so, then remove double boiler from hot water and let it cool.
2. Sift dry ingredients together - except for pecans and chocolate chips.
3. Add wet ingredients - at room temperature, not warmer - to dry ingredients.  When mixed, add pecans & chocolate chips.
4. Turn into lightly oiled pan lined with parchment paper, bake 22-24 minutes at 350.  This will fit in a large loaf pan or a 9 x 9 pan if you like thinner blondies (which will need to be removed sooner than a deeper pan).  Keep an eye on this - if you increase the recipe size, it will take longer.  If you use a dark metal pan that holds more heat, they will cook faster and you will end up with cookie instead of blondie.  You want to see the blondies puff up and get tall, filling the sides of the pan and becoming golden brown on top.  A 3x batch fits a 13 x 9 pan and takes well over 40 minutes to achieve doneness!

Plum Coffee Cake

Tomorrow is the East Bay Vegan Bake Sale - I wanted to make something that could be made for a reasonably affordable amount (making the final product cheaper!) and which could be made in quantity and that would use some of my fresh/local yummy ingredients.  Originally, I thought of making my favorites - lemon bars, chocolate peanut butter cups and such but since I haven't had a good coffee cake lately ... well...

A coffee cake with plum topping seemed like the ideal choice - and being too lazy to convert my grandmother's Bavarian Coffee Cake recipe (I swear! I will do it one day soon!) - I took inspiration from VeganYumYum's Apple Pie Coffee Cake recipe.  Here's my spin, resulting in ...


Crumble Top Cherry Plum Coffee Cake:


FRUIT TOPPING:
1 qt bag of plum puree (that good stuff leftover in the jelly bag from making jelly last summer with the cherry plums)
1 c succanat

Set puree & succanat on the stove on low to simmer - reduce til thick, at least reduce by 50%.

CRUMBLE TOPPING
1 c oats
1 c flour
1/2 c dark brown sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 c melted coconut oil
1 tsp cinnamon

Blend all ingredients til you can cake them together with your hands and crumble into bits - yum.

CAKE

2 1/2 c whole wheat pastry flour
2 1/2 c unbleached flour
1 c unrefined granulated sugar
1 c succanat
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp salt

3 tsp Mexican cinnamon (ceylon cinnamon)
2 tsp ground cardomom
1/2 tsp powdered ginger
2/3 c canola or grapeseed oil (or a blend)
2/3 c plum puree
1 1/3 cup almond milk + 2 tb apple cider vinegar
3 tb En-R-G Egg replacer
1 tsp almond extract
2 tsp vanilla extract

Blend all ingredients - should be very thick, almost like a dough - it will rise and goodness will happen.  Lightly oil your pan(s) - I decided to use a springform pan and two tart pans.  Press down the dough with a nice flat silicone spatula, push the sides up a tiny bit like a border.  Ladle in your cooked down plum goodness.  Sprinkle on the crumble topping.  Put into the oven at 350 - you want the cake to cook all the way through, and rise, so don't take it out too soon or you'll have soggy centers.

Tomorrow I'll take the coffee cakes and a dozen or so dark chocolate chipotle caramels, over to the East Bay Vegan Bake Sale.  11a-4p, 20 Glen Ave, Oakland (just off Piedmont)  in front of a shop called "Issues."

Vegan/Gluten-free & Soy-Free Mexican Chocolate Cake

After reading up on some vegan flourless chocolate cakes and applesauce cakes, I mostly adapted from this recipe on Karina's Kitchen blog, I have to offer you this persimmon chocolate cake which is vegan, gluten-free & soy-free, low fat and made without refined sugar but which tastes so rich and delicious, and is so easy to make that I made three of them.

Ron's Birthday Cake
Put dry ingredients into your mixing bowl or food processor cup:

3/4 c. sorghum flour
1/4 c. amaranth flour
3 tablespoons corn starch
1/2 cup organic sucanat
1 Tb dry Ener-G Egg Replacer
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp sea salt
1 tsp cinnamon
4 Tb Xocolatl cocoa powder (or regular cocoa powder)

Mix to blend dry ingredients, then addwet ingredients:

1 c persimmon puree
4 oz. melted dark chocolate
2 tablespoons Spectrum Organic Shortening
1/2 c raw agave nectar
2 tsp champagne vinegar
3 tsp vanilla extract
3 tsp coffee extract - or - 1 Tb instant or finely ground coffee
1 tsp almond extract

Blend until smooth, then pour into prepared springform pan. Bake in pre-heated 350F oven till firm - about 30 to 35 minutes, depending on the size of your pan and altitude. Cool on a wire rack. Chill or eat right away with your fingers and call it a "test," before making another one.

I'll be serving this with a persimmon sauce that I made with 1 c. persimmon, 1 c. water, 1 c. sucanat and cooked down to nearly persimmon butter consistency.