Happy New Year everyone! I wish you all a wonderful year, and I hope all your wishes come true. I have been thinking a bit about my New Year resolutions and I have a short list I will be keeping in mind.
1. Spread the vegan joy of baking and educate other people about living cruelty free
2. Finally start those Buddhism classes I have been meaning to follow
3. Continue my Japanese classes
4. Start Yoga
A short list I hope I will be able to keep up the entire year. I know N1 will be very easy to follow! Let’s start the year with a divine cake recipe which reminds me of those English tea cakes.
I found this recipe in The Joy Of Vegan Baking which is fast becoming my baking reference. I feel like she is a modern, vegan version of Martha Stewart! I love it!
This cake is the Cranberry Nut Bread (p.61), which I researched because I MIRACULOUSLY found cranberries at the market and wanted to try and bake something with them. I had never seen actual cranberries before, only the juice version of them. I feel like an alien! This cake could be brought to the Queen Of England for tea time because it is so perfect. Nice and soft on the inside and crispy on the outside. It is the perfect mix of sweetness from the dough, and bitterness from the cranberries. Next time I think I will add the candied fruit which I didn’t have on hand and more nuts too. What I felt while making this cake is that is had a lot of ingredients. I kept having to go search my pantry, but they are easy ingredients which require only ‘measure and pour’. It is a very easy recipe to follow. I did everything by hand after an incident I recently had with my KitchenAid + flour + high mixing level = the entire kitchen and I dusted white like a fancy dessert!
I think that it would also be super cute in mini loaf pans to be given out as little gifts.
I followed all the ingredients except that I replaced the orange juice with a tropical fruit juice. I am always a little handicapped when I try recipes with ground flaxseed as egg replacement. The directions always say, “mix until fluffy” or “until thoroughly combined and thick”. And all I ever get it a soup consistency! No worries, I never managed to fluff my egg whites either! So this time I used the flaxseed, but maybe next time I will replace that with the Egg Replacer from Bob’s Red Mill which I adore. And yes that one does fluff! I am interested to see the difference it will make to the fluffiness of the cake.
Okay so I will quickly sum up the recipe so you can get an idea.
So in the dough you add the non foamy flaxseed and water mix, margarine, vanilla extract, orange juice, non-dairy milk, flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, lemon or orange zest, fresh or frozen whole cranberries, candied fruit and toasted nuts of your choice. All this cooks at 350F for about 1 hour. I cooked mine a little less than what was instructed on the recipe as I always check with a toothpick towards the end of the baking time. My toothpick came out clean about 10mins before the end of the cooking time. It is then important to let it cool a little before serving which always proves to be very difficult.
I hope you guys will try this recipe, it really is great.
Have a great 2012!
ur cake was absolutely fantastic! I can’t wait to try it again with some candied fruits 🙂 even tho the cranberries were a little bit sour, the dough made up for it big time! IT was absolutely delicious!!!
thanks a ton!! mwah
I love that you tried the fresh cranberries! If you have leftovers, freeze them and add them to oatmeal. at the very last moment. They will defrost and pop in your mouth. So tart and yummy! Good on you for trying something new!