Recipe – Lunar New Year Vegan Cake

Chúc mừng năm mới, 恭喜發財, Happy Lunar New Year! It’s the last day of the 3-day celebration and I wanted to share a recipe for the Lunar New Year Vegan Cake I made this year. Going vegan for the new year has roots in Buddhism, where we believe that starting off the new year vegan grants us good karma. In that spirit, I’ve been making vegan dishes all week, including this cake. I got inspired after taking the family to Tanaka Farms last weekend and picking fresh strawberries. There’s nothing like eating freshly picked strawberries, but with four big clamshells between us, I had some extra strawberries to mess around with. Since the traditional colors of Lunar New Year are red and gold, I thought that the deep red of the strawberries would go great on a cake with yellow sponge and gold frosting.

I tried something different for this post. Instead of posting photos of the process, I made a Buzzfeed-style video to show the actual steps. It might be something I keep in the future – not sure! Any feedback is welcomed. Anyway, here’s the video:

The Batter

Since this is a vegan batter, the timing of the ingredients is key. The rise comes from the reaction of the baking soda and the distilled white vinegar, so be sure to add the vinegar right at the end to keep the bubbles fresh when putting the sponges in the oven.

This recipe is for a two-tiered cake, so I recommend weighing your batter and dividing it evenly between two 6″ springform pans.

The Frosting

The frosting was so difficult to get right. I’ve been looking online for the past couple of months for a healthier frosting that doesn’t use cream cheese or a bunch of powdered sugar without using ingredients that aren’t normally in my house. Making it vegan on top of that? Super difficult. So I decided to make my own version.

Vegan butter is a hit or miss when it comes to frostings. Miyoko’s brand works really well. I think it’s because of the ratio of coconut oil and cultured cashew milk. Coconut oil is solid at colder temperatures, whereas cultured cashew milk is nice and creamy. Complete speculation of my part, but it did the trick!

A lot of frosting recipes call for powdered sugar. To make mine more kid-friendly (I don’t want to imagine my almost threenager hopped up on a sugar frosting!), I substituted with a powdered monkfruit/erythritol mixture. I’ve found that it works very much like powdered sugar, but without the sugar and without the calories! I’m aiming to do a dedicated post on erythritol, including GI research, but none of my family members has a sensitivity to it so I figure it’d be okay.

The tricky part with vegan healthy frosting is the consistency. A little bit of cornstarch helps bind the mixture together. But instead of adding a bunch of cornstarch and/or more powdered monkfruit/erythritol, I recommend thickening the frosting with finely-ground almond flour. It does the job, plus it adds a but of nuttiness and body to the frosting. Similar to a pure sugar frosting where you can feel the sugar crystals as you bite into it, you can feel a little bit of grit from the almond flour (but not too much!). Anyway, I’m quite happy with how it turned out. I haven’t tried piping it, but it seems strong enough to pipe!

Lunar New Year Vegan Cake

Methods:

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. In a mixing bowl, add flour, baking soda, and salt and whisk.
3. To the mixing bowl, add maple syrup, almond milk, olive oil, vanilla extract, and distilled white vinegar. Whisk until just combined – don’t overmix!
4. Line two 6″ springform pans with silicone baking sheets and pour half the batter into each pan.
5. Bake for ~25min or until a toothpick comes out clean.
6. Cool on a rack for 10min before loosening the springform collar, then cool sponges completely.
7. Use a serrated knife to cut any domed portions of the sponges to make them more flat.
8. Make the frosting by whisking softened vegan butter until smooth, then slowly whisking in powdered monkfruit/erythritol.
9. Add vanilla extract and almond milk, then whisk.
10. If the frosting is really runny, add cornstarch and whisk. Still runny? Thicken it with almond flour. If the frosting is too stiff, add more almond milk and whisk.
11. Add golden food coloring and whisk.
12. Refrigerate frosting for ~10min to firm up.
13. Use a spoon to dollop frosting on top of one layer of cake.
14. Add a layer of sliced strawberries on top of the frosting layer. Place second sponge on top, making sure it is aligned properly.
15. Dollop frosting on top of the second layer of sponge as well as the sides of the stacked sponges. Use an angled spatula to smooth the frosting around the cake. I find that using a cake decorating turntable helps out a lot!
16. Write/decorate the top of the cake as you wish.
17. Lightly press sliced strawberries on the sides of the cake, all with the pointy side facing up.
18. If not eating right away, refrigerate. Otherwise, slice in and enjoy!