Vegan, Gluten-Free
I’ve always loved baking. I can’t remember when I started … I know it was with my grandma in my early elementary years. By age 9 I was baking banana muffins, oatmeal cookies, and homemade pancakes all by myself. So pancakes may not sound impressive, but these were the days of standard box mixes predominating. Everything came in a box in the 90s.
So when I started to have incredible stomach pains in my mid – late twenties that eventually lead to me needing to eliminate hard to digest foods like gluten, eggs, and dairy … baking sadly went out the window for me.
Until last fall, when I started scouring the internet for bakes that were free from eggs & dairy (vegan) and could be converted to gluten free with the GF all purpose flour mixes popping up in the organic sections. I know how hard it is to find delicious recipes for gastrointestinal sufferers … so my hope is in sharing these recipes, someone will find them and enjoy them.
So here is the Vegan, GF Cookies n’ Cream cake I made myself for Mother’s Day … and it is so very good.
Vegan, GF Chocolate Cake: (*adapted from www.noracooks.com)
-
1 cup unsweetened almond milk
-
1 tbsp vinegar of apple cider vinegar (I always use regular vinegar)
-
2 cups all purposed GF flour blend (remember to use proper measure and sift thoroughly for better cake texture)
-
1 3/4 cups white sugar
-
3/4 cup cocoa powder
-
2 tsp baking powder
-
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
-
1 tsp salt
-
1/2 canola oil
-
1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
-
1 Tbsp vanilla (yes, tablespoon)
-
1 cup boiling water
1. Preheat oven 350F and prepare two circular cake tins with baking parchment.
2. Combine almond milk and vinegar and set aside. This creates vegan “buttermilk” and helps with the leavening of the cake.
3. Sift well the GF flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
4. Whisk the canola oil, applesauce, vanilla and almond milk. Then add the the dry ingredients and fold together until just mixed.
5. Now the secret part! Add 1 cup of boiling water to the batter, mix together and immediately distribute to prepared pans and bake! Bake 30-35 minutes
Cookies n Cream “Buttercream” Vanilla frosting:
This is just a combination of crushing up some Vegan, GF Oreo cookies (I use the Kinnikinnick brand) and my vanilla frosting.
1/2 cup vegan margarine or butter
1/2 tsp vanilla
2 cups icing sugar
2-4 tsp almond milk.
1/2-2/3 cup crushed & chopped GF, Vegan Oreo cookies
-
Cream margarine/butter until smooth and mix in vanilla.
-
Add in the icing sugar and beat on high. Adding in enough tsp of almond milk to get your desired consistency.
-
Fold in the crushed/roughly chopped cookies.
Preparing the cake:
I like to assemble this way: 1 layer chocolate cake topped with a light layer of frosting and a large handful of crushed/chopped cookies then repeat the layers and ice the entirety of the cake. Topping with more cookies of course!
