I love cake and sweets.
How better to commemorate my quarter-century on earth than by bringing in a cake to share with my friends at work?
I wanted to make something impressive and fancy, but also tasty. In other words, I wanted to show off! It’s my day, dammit, so I’m allowed!
I decided to go with the flavour combination of Chocolate Orange – two great tastes that taste great together! I used the Vegan Chocolate cake and Vegan Orange cake recipes from Joy of cooking, as they are both easy and tasty. I made a 10″ (I think) round cake, because I don’t have an appropriately-sized rectangle pan, and I find round cakes require less trimming and waste.
There were two chocolate layers and one orange one, and each layer was split in half and filled. I made a whipped chocolate ganache to fill the orange layer.
I made orange curd for the first time as a filling for the chocolate layers. While I liked the overall texture and flavour of the orange curd, I expected it to be zestier (this could be remedied by substituting more orange juice for the water, and adding some lemon juice). As well, I used a peeler-style zester, which resulted in very long strings of zest. I would recommend using a grater or microplane-style zester instead.
I froze the cakes after making, splitting, and cooling them, since I think vegan cakes tend to stale faster than traditional ones, and I had made them two days in advance.
Everything was assembled with chocolate buttercream, and topped with a dark chocolate glaze. Yummy!
I was also fortunate enough to spend my birthday with my family. Knowing my penchant for carbohydrates, they made me a dinner full of my childhood favourites: macaroni and cheese, greek salad, and garlic bread! For dessert we had an old family favourite, Mud Pie
I felt so loved that my family took the time to get together, and make me dinner, on a work night. You guys are the best!
I especially want to thank my mom and dad for all of the love and guidance they have given me. I know now how lucky I am to have had such a great family life.
Here’s to another year of growth, learning and happiness!
Recipe: Orange-Chocolate Birthday Cake
Chocolate Vegan Cake (from Joy of Cooking) – For the cake I made, I repeated this recipe twice:
Ingredients:
– 1 1/2 cups All-purpose flour
– 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons Sugar
– 6 tablespoons Cocoa powder
– 1 teaspoon Baking soda
– 1/8 teaspoon Salt
– 1/4 cup Vegetable oil
– 1 cup Cold water
– 1 tablespoon White vinegar
– 2 teaspoons vanilla
Directions:
- Preheat the oven to 350F.
- Prepare a 9 or 10-inch spring form pan by lining with paper and spraying with non-stick cooking spray.
- Combine dry ingredients and mix on low speed until well “sifted.”
- Combine the wet ingredients and add to the dry.
- Stir on medium-low speed until smooth.
- Scrape into your prepared pan. Drop on the counter a few times to remove air bubbles.
- Bake for 30-35 minutes.
- Remove from the oven when a toothpick comes out clean.
- Cool for 5 minutes on the rack.
- Slide a knife around the edges of the pan. Remove the sides of the pan.
- Keeping the cake on the parchment paper, slide it off the bottom and on to a cooling rack.
- Wait approximately 15 minutes before peeling off the parchment paper liner.
- Cut the cake horizontally in half FIRST, then cut off the dome of the top. Doing it in this order gives you a stiffer top half when manipulating them.
- Place plastic wrap between the layers (multiple spatulas may come in handy at this point!) to prevent them from sticking back together.
- Wrap tightly and freeze, if desired.
- When thawing frozen cake, allow to come to almost room temperature (no more condensation on the plastic wrap) before removing the wrappings.
Ultra Orange Cake (from Joy of Cooking):
Ingredients:
– 1 1/2 cups All-purpose flour
– 1 cup Sugar
– 1 teaspoon Baking soda
– 1/2 teaspoon Salt
– 1/3 cup Vegetable oil
– 1 cup Orange juice
– Zest from one large orange (about 2 tablespoons)
– 1 tablespoon Cider vinegar
– 1 teaspoon vanilla
Directions:
- Preheat the oven to 350F.
- Prepare a 9 or 10-inch spring form pan by lining with paper and spraying with non-stick cooking spray.
- Combine dry ingredients and mix on low speed until well “sifted.”
- Combine the wet ingredients and add to the dry.
- Stir on medium-low speed until smooth.
- Scrape into your prepared pan. Drop on the counter a few times to remove air bubbles.
- Bake for 30-35 minutes.
- Remove from the oven when a toothpick comes out clean.
-
Cool, cut, wrap, and freeze as described above.
Whipped Chocolate Ganache Filling:
Ingredients:
– 3/4 cup High-quality coconut milk (gold can, but room-temperature and SHAKEN before opening)
– 160g Dark chocolate chips
Directions:
- Heat the coconut milk in a heavy-bottomed saucepan, on medium heat.
- Once the milk is simmering, remove from the heat.
- Pour the hot milk over the chocolate chips in a heat-proof bowl.
- Stir with a spatula until the ganache is a shiny, dark brown.
- Chill for an hour or more.
- Whip the mixture with the whisk attachment of a stand mixture until the topping is the texture of soft whipped cream
- Use to fill the orange cake layers.
Orange Curd Filling (original by Agent Minty):
Ingredients:
– 1/2 cup Sugar
– 3 tablespoons Bird’s custard powder
– Zest of 1 large orange
– 1/3 cup plus 1/2 cup Orange juice
– 1 cup Water
– 2 teaspoons Arrowroot powder
– 1 tablespoon Coconut milk
Directions:
- Combine sugar, custard powder, orange zest, and half of the orange juice in a saucepan.
- Whisk over low heat until sugar and custard powder are dissolved.
- Add the water and stir.
- Bring heat to medium under saucepan.
- Bring the mixture to a low simmer.
- Dissolve the arrowroot powder in the remaining orange juice.
- Add the arrowroot-orange juice mixture to the saucepan. Whisk well.
- Add the coconut milk.
- Whisk wile heating until the mixture boils gently. You may need to increase the heat slightly.
- When the mixture is the consistency of yogurt (?), take it off the heat. It will continue to thicken as it cools!
- Whisk occasionally until the curd is lukewarm.
- Scrape into a container and store in the refrigerator until needed.
- Use to fill the chocolate cake layers.
Chocolate Buttercream (adapted from the Purity Cookbook):
Ingredients:
– 10 tablespoons Softened margarine (use higher-quality stuff, like Earth Balance brand)
– 1 1/2 teaspoons Vanilla
– Pinch of salt
– 1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon cocoa powder
– 9 cups icing sugar
– 1/2 cup room-temperature coconut milk
Directions:
- Beat the margarine, vanilla, and salt together until fluffy.
- Mix together the cocoa powder and the icing sugar.
- Add 1/3 of the dry mixture to the butter mixture.
- Beat on medium until incorporated.
- Add half of the coconut milk.
- Beat on medium until incorporated.
- Add another portion of the dry mixture.
- Beat on medium until incorporated.
- Add the remaining coconut milk.
- Beat on medium until incorporated.
- Add another portion of the dry mixture.
- Beat on high until fluffy.
- Adjust the consistency of the icing as desired by adding more “milk” or icing sugar.
- Use to paste together the cake layers, and frost the outside of the cake. An offset spatula really helps!
Chocolate Glaze (from Dad):
Ingredients:
– 1 cup Chocolate chips
– 3 tablespoons Hot coffee
– 3 tablespoons Softened margarine (I used the high-quality kind)
– 1 tablespoon Orange liqueur, orange extract, or extra coffee.
Directions:
- Melt the chocolate chips on low heat, preferable in a double boiler.
- Brew the coffee.
- Add the hot coffee to the melted chocolate and stir. This will look terrible, but don’t despair!
- Add the margarine and stir rapidly. Aha, you’re getting an emulsion!
- Add the flavouring and stir some more.
- If you want this runner, add more hot coffee.
- Drizzle all over the cake or anything else that could use some pizzazz.
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