That cake is Vegan.
Soy cream, Eggless Chocolate Cake and Canned fruit.
This month doesn't seem to have started right.
I paid a colossal amount of money for a hair treatment and cut ,which would have cost me only half at the salon next to the fancy schmancy Valet parking place I drove into.
And despite the chemicals and moolah that went into my hair and down the drain there, my hair is back to its frizzy,crabby self that manifests in the Monsoons.
The app that I use for saving my blogposts has been swallowing all my words and then simply crashing. I literally feel like that hulk guy here... wanting to push my fist through the Ipad screen and save my precious words.
And of those who committed to attending my workshops, atleast one has been dropping out.
And I couldn't find canned cherries anywhere in Colaba when I needed them . So thats why this black forest is tropical with canned pineapple.
Oh, and did I mention, my phone fell and now I'm living with a cracked screen.
Awesomeness.
So thats that.
Hopefully.
But this cake is a perfect example that things can go right.
After baking about a thousand and more cakes , I've realized that I am able to remember a precious few. And they work perfectly well,each time.
This is one of them.
This is my go to , one bowl vegan chocolate cake and you can find it here.
But since this is half that, I'll save you the maths.
For the
One bowl Vegan Chocolate Cake
You need
1 1/2 cup flour
1/4 cup cocoa powder
1 cup sugar
1 cup water
1 tsp vinegar
1 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp baking soda or bicarbonate of soda
Pinch salt
1/3 cup neutral vegetable oil -I used Rice bran (that's what I had)
1 tsp vanilla essence
Preheat the oven to 175C.
Prepare 2 round 5 inch tins, lined with parchment paper and sides greased and floured. This will give you one tall cake. I made three layers because I had three tins-6 layers and therefore three layers in two cakes.
If you use a bigger cake tin ,you would not need to split the cake as the layers will be thin enough already.
In a saucepan, mix the water and sugar and warm gently to melt the sugar. Mix in the oil. Make sure the water is not hot and mix in the vanilla and vinegar.
In a large bowl ,sift in the cocoa,flour ,salt, baking powder and soda and mix well. Pour the wet into the dry and whisk well, making sure no globules and knots of dry stuff are left.
Divide the batter into the two tins equally and pop in to the oven for 35-40 minutes.
Check with a toothpick or a Sarah stick after 35 minutes. Clean stick? Bring onto a wire rack to cool. After 10 minutes ,run a knife around the tins and turn teh cakes over a parchment paper and leave to cool completely over the rack.
For best results while frosting, chill the cakes atleast 6 hours, wrapped in cling film in the fridge.
For making this into a. black forest cake,you need
One time Canned Pitted Cherries in syrup -drained ,syrup reserved
600gms non dairy whipping cream -I used Rich
100gms chocolate curls
I couldn't find cherries that day ,so I used the Del Monte fruit cocktail.
If you have the cherries,place the drained cherries with 2-3 tbsp liquid into a pan and mix a tsp or so of cornflour/cornstarch.
Stirring continuously, bring up to the boil to cook the starch and set aside to cool.
Whip the cream till it is stiff.
Remove the cakes from the fridge and unwrap them. The tendency to crumble is much less when the are chilled.
Split the cakes into two layers each if you are confident. Otherwise, don't try and break up the cake.
If you don't split the cakes, you may want to spread a tbsp of the cherry liquid over the layers. But as this cake is very moist, you won't need to. So that extra liquid is optional.
Mix 3-4 tbsp cream into the same amount of cooked and cooled cherries.
Spread over the cake to make atleast a half inch layer. Mix more if needed.
Be generous.
If you have only two tiers ,your cherry filling can be thicker. The more cherry cream mix you have the yummier it will be.
We mixed the drained fruits into cream and used that .
Since the fruits are chunky, I didn't want to risk the third tier falling off. But with cherries, feel free to fill all th players with that.
Now cover the sides and the top of the cake with teh cream to seal th scrubs and chill in the fridge atleast half and hour.
Use your regular peeler and make curls on parchment paper.
Now bring out the cooled cake and slather the sides and top with more cream . Use a turntable for the smoothest results. The best way to clean sides is when you use bench scraper or a metal ruler that has sharp angles.
Top with the Chocolate curls and pipe rosettes with cream on the top. Place a cherry on each rosette. These are dehydrated cherries.
Just when you have to slice the cake, use a long knife dipped in hot water and wiped with a tissue.
Serve ...
We were 4 women chatting away to glory and hence the pictures are limited.
