Triple Chocolate Cake

I’ve really been craving chocolate cake lately, but don’t have my go-to vegan shops of Vancouver anymore. So, I decided I would make brownies and settle for that. Much to my surprise, after a few tweeks to the recipe, these ‘brownies’ came out fluffy and cake-like  - and super delicious! Definitely a new favourite in our home :o)

Triple Chocolate Cake

What you’ll need: 

• 1 1/2 cups of flour (I used whole wheat and spelt mixed)
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 3/4 cup cocoa powder 
• 1 cup sweetener of choice (I used brown sugar and coconut sugar mixed)
• 1 pack (300 grams) soft/silken tofu *MAPLE CARAMEL flavour 
• 3/4 cup coconut oil
• 3/4 cup almond milk
• 3 tsp vanilla 
• 2 cups vegan chocolate chips, kept separate

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Oil 8 x 8 cake pan and set aside. In a medium bowl, stir together flour, baking soda, salt, cocoa powder, 1 cup of chocolate chips, and sugar and set aside.

 In a food processor, blend tofu, coconut oil, almond milk, and vanilla. add to flour mixture and stir until gently mixed. if the batter seems a little stiff or dry, add more almond milk. 

 Pour into baking pan and sprinkle top evenly with the rest of the chocolate chips. Bake for 45-50 minutes or until a toothpick or knife comes out clean. Cool before cutting or removing from pan. 

*I really think this flavour of tofu is what made this cake so successful, but if you don’t have it, you could use any kind of silken/soft tofu. I just picked it up at Superstore, and I’ve seen it at Safeway too.    

Molasses Ginger Cookies

These cookies are so good, I haven’t even finished baking all the trays and I had to post about them! Soft, chewy, yummy, and vegan, if these don’t make believers out of non-vegans, I don’t know what will!

What you'll need: 

• 4 cups flour (I used 2 whole wheat, one spelt, and one oat)
• 1 cup sugar (I used coconut sugar, my new favourite sweetener!)
• 3 Tbsp ginger powder
• 1/2+ cup water (you may need a bit more to get a good consistency)
• 1/2- 3/4 cup molasses
• 2/3 cup melted vegan buttery spread (I used virgin coconut oil)
  dash of salt
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1-2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 4 tsp baking powder
  
  
  Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.
  
  Soften the vegan butter spread in the microwave. Set aside.
  
  In a large mixing bowl, combine the dry ingredients: flour, sugar, ginger powder, cinnamon, salt, baking soda/powder. Mix well.
  
  In a separate bowl, combine the softened buttery spread, molasses, vanilla extract, grated ginger and water.
  
  Combine the wet and dry ingredients and stir by hand well until all the ingredients are blended into a moist ball of dough. The dough will seem dry at first, but keep stirring and folding and it will come together. If needed add in extra water one spoonful at a time until the dough consistency is reached.
  
  Roll into small inch by inch balls (or bigger if you want big cookies, but make sure you leave a enough spacing for expansion!) and place on greased cookie sheet. If you want perfectly shaped ginger cookies, you can freeze the dough for 1/2 hour then roll out the dough to cookie cutter circle shapes for baking. I didn’t do this and they still look nice and I didn’t have that extra wait time! (If you want crunchier, thinner Gingersnaps - roll the dough out thin, cut into thin circle shapes and bake.)
  
  Bake at 375 for 7-9 minutes. Fluffy, but not hard. Cookies will firm up when they cool. Note: do not over-bake - or you will get gingerSNAPS instead of cookie chews. I found these cookies baked really fast.
  
  Allow the cookies to cool at least 15 minutes before serving. They will harden as they cool as well as overnight. These freeze very well!

Aunty Kerry's Banana Bread - Vegan Style!

Hey Everyone!

Sorry it’s been so long since I posted - after getting a pretty hectic job in Vancouver as an ESL teacher, my blogging seemed to fall by the wayside. After 9 months of that, I decided to move to Winnipeg and have spent the last two months unpacking and getting settled and such.

Now all that is done, and I’ve actually gotten a job at a bakery! It’s not vegan mind you, and I’m not baking (working front counter) but it has inspired me to bake a lot more. That and my boyfriend has 5 kids who sure do love baked goods, so I’ve been turning out the healthy treats like never before!

Today, I’m going to share with you one of their (and my) favourites: Vegan Banana Bread. I have to give an extreme amount of credit to my Aunty Kerry for this one, because all I’ve done is taken her recipe and substituted in vegan ingredients where needed and the types of flour I like to work with.

I’m 1000% positive that you, and any little ones you share it with, will love this soft, dense cake!

What you’ll need:

• 4- 6 really ripe bananas, mashed
• 1 tbsp vanilla
• 1 cup coconut oil
• 1 cup coconut sugar or agave nectar
• 2 cups Spelt flour mixed with oat flour or Kamut flour
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 2 ‘eggs’ *

Optional:

• 1 cup chocolate chips (I highly recommend them!)
• 1 cup of coconut (also a wonderful addition!)

*To make egg replacement, simply mix two tbsp of ground flaxseed with 3 tbsp of water to make the equivalent of 1 egg. I usually make up my ‘eggs’ at the very beginning, as they need to sit for a few minutes to thicken anyway. I sometimes find that I need to be a bit more generous with the water to get the consistency of an egg. You’ll see after it sits a few minutes it does thicken up like an egg quite nicely.

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. In a food processor, blend sugar and coconut oil. Mix in ‘eggs’. In a separate bowl, mash the bananas and vanilla together. Add to wet mixture and blend again.

In another bowl, mix all the dry ingredients together. If you are using chocolate chips or shredded coconut, add these as well. Add wet ingredients to dry and mix well. Pour into a greased loaf pan or muffin tins and bake until dark brown (about 45mins-1 hour).

Let loaf or muffins sit for a few minutes before you take them out as this is a very moist cake and it tends to break if taken out while still very hot! This banana bread is really tasty with a bit of coconut oil spread on like butter. Hope you like it as much as we do!