Category Archives: Recipe

My goodness. I think this is the most popular cake I’ve made in a very long time. I’ve been asked three different times for the recipe, and I even debated posting this recipe BEFORE vegan mofo. Clearly I didn’t. Mostly because I never got my act together getting photos. I’ve made it for three different birthdays, making it perfect todays prompt- Birthday Bash. So what flavors should you expect with a Hummingbird Cake? Some floral notes? A super sweet syrup? What makes it “humming bird”? Well, it is actually pineapple and banana flavored cake with a cream cheese frosting.

As for the history of the cake- well that’s where things get messy. There are LOTS of theories, which is pretty common with any type of recipe. The most popular answer is that the cake originated in Jamaica. It is named a “doctor bird cake” because it is a common name for a Jamaican hummingbird.

Then there is the idea that this cake is naturally Southern in origin (er… Southern USA that is.) Any cake historian (is that a real job?) will agree that this cake was widely popularized by Southern Living in 1978. The recipe was submitted by Mrs. L.H. Wiggins of Greensboro, North Carolina. But here’s the thing- there might not be a L.H. Wiggins of Greensboro. Heck, even Southern Living is admitting this. It seems that there are many variations of this cake before 1978 where tropical fruit appear in a spiced cake in a tube pan. The idea of serving this styled cake in three layers with cream cheese frosting might of been a first.

American Cakes subscribes to the theory that Jamaican Airlines came up with the cake. Supposedly the airlines came up with a press packet that included a recipe for this cake. Why hummingbird? Well, their logo is of a hummingbird! Duh!

Whatever the history is, this cake is a classic in the South. It is Southern Living’s most requested recipe, and man is it delicious. This was a pretty easy cake to veganize, just sub the eggs for some aquafaba and that’s it. It took a little time to figure out the portions of the cream cheese frosting. The recipe below is JUST enough for 3 layers. If you want to make more, that’s fine. It is also worth noting that if you are making this vegan cake and aren’t vegan yourself, you can avoid by “fake” vegan food by buying mainstream accidentally vegan cream cheese frosting in a can.

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When I first tackled on my American Cakes challenge last year, I was overwhelmed with excitement. Ideas where flying through my head on what to try, and I was excited to learn more about American classics. I quickly started to learn more about our history than just cakes. Sure there were a few pies in the book, including a shoo fly pie, but I was learning about green tomato pies and vinegar pies. I am hoping to make these this year, but it got me thinking, what other desserts are very American? And that’s when I swallowed my fears and looked up a recipe for Ambrosia Salad.

Let’s be clear- this is hardly a salad. At the very least, not a salad by any modern sense. The word salad was used more loosely in the past than it is today. So loose that it was often used for various aspics using vegetables. Heck, even the term Jello Salad comes up as type of dessert on Wikipedia. So I will swallow my pride, and delve into this piece of American cuisine, and besides, I remember these desserts always tasting better than it looked.

Unlike a Jello Salad, Ambrosia has no gelatin, but it kind-of gets clumped together. The origins of this dessert seems much more classy. The original recipe from 1867 was pretty simple- grate fresh coconut and toss with some sugar. Layer the coconut with orange segments and serve in dessert dishes. The name came from Greek mythology, as ambrosia was food for the gods, and they would grow weak without it. The dish would most likely be served during the winter, and I could see this simple dish tasting refreshing and sweet after having no fresh fruit for so long.

But times change, and so did fruit production. The United States started to increase it’s production of citruses, making them cheaper. Canned fruit became much more common and cheaper for people, so using canned fruit became more common place, and naturally, pineapple started to make an appearance. Some recipes asked for whipped cream, booze, or just tossed with heavy cream. And by the 1900s, various different fruit started to get mixed it, ranging from strawberries to bananas to cherries.

This was around the time when ambrosia started to become a Christmas thing. Let it be known, not all American make ambrosia for the holiday season. I never even heard of this until now, so don’t ask your American friend if they got their marshmallows for their yule tide salad. This is mostly a tradition in the South, and by 1930s, it became common knowledge that this is a Southern tradition.

As time went by tropical fruit became less special. As mentioned earlier, canned fruit became more common place and cheaper. So it didn’t take long before we added more sweets to the dish- marshmallows. The earliest recipes called for marshmallow fluff to be added, before marshmallows became commercially available. But once machines were invented to mass produce marshmallows, it didn’t take long to add them to recipe in late 20s to 30s.

Today, the dish has a million variations. Heck there is a recipe in How It All Vegan that uses tofu, orange juice, and a whole basket full of fruit. Some people stick to it’s very traditional fruit salad roots, and some people make a molded dish with it. There are recipes for a baked salad, and some recipes use mayo. The dish has gotten quite a bad rep, coming up in the ranks with fruitcake. So many chefs are trying to reinvent ambrosia. Some are simple enough, using fresh fruit again, some involve a very loose interpretation of soup, and one person it means “fresh grapefruit and navel oranges, chopped celery, avocado, and cucumber flavored with fresh basil and jalapeno and tossed in a buttermilk-lime dressing with two tablespoons of shredded coconut.” Too much of a stretch to me.

So what the heck am I making? It seems the common thread with this dish are usually tied to these ingredients- whipped cream, marshmallows, pineapple, coconut, and oranges. So that’s what I did. I ditched the shredded coconut and used coconut milk as the whipped cream. Sadly, I can figure out HOW to get coconut creme to whip up. No clue what I am doing wrong. BUT that is okay, having a sweetened coconut coating is still yummy. I also ditched the canned fruit and used fresh. It’ll cost you more, but totally worth it.

Now, if you can’t find mini marshmallows, leave them out. But I figured if Alton Brown includes marshmallows, then dang it, they stay in. Luckily I only us HALF a bag of marshmallows, so that won’t be TOO expensive. The downfall is that this salad doesn’t last too long. The coconut milk will slowly soften the marshmallows, making it yummy, but wait too long, it’ll make it mushy. So I suggest making this the morning of, perhaps for a potluck or family get together. I honestly think it won’t last long, but if you have leftover, gobble it all up the next day.

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This week is budget week, and this is indeed a budget cake. Most of the ingredients are cheap ingredients that most people have in their pantry. The only “expensive” ingredient is the vegan butter that you put on the top, and the vegan milk of choice. But I used some homemade oatmilk, making it only cost pennies.

What I find really interesting about this recipe is how information changes from the American Cakes book when I start googling things. The book described this as a coffee cake, to much confusion to the international audience. No- there is no coffee flavor to this cake. Rather this is a cake you would have with your afternoon coffee, much like a teacake is for when you have tea. Most American coffee cakes are usually unfrosted, and have crumb topping. This cake has a crisp sugar topping instead of the crumb, which I haven’t really seen before. But some quick googling shows that most people describe this as a breakfast food. It might seem far fetched but makes sense, it is quick to make and by today’s standard of donuts and danishes, it isn’t so bad.

All the recipes that came up have an interesting marbling effect. Well, this is because the photos in the book doesn’t quite portray this, so I didn’t understand the recipe. I kept the slices of butter near the top and very thin. Most people I think put bigger chunks and dunk them deep into the batter. So I will give directions for my way of making this cake, but you can easily dip the butter further down the batter.

Many people say it is a variation of a Swedish Flop Cake, which seems like a stretch. There are many people describing the cake as having an Amish background. This seems really plausible. A recipe from American Cakes that I’ve been dying to try is the Moravian Sugar Cake, which seems to have similar buttery dimples in it.

So why is it a Cinnamon Flop? As Anne Byrn puts it

Could this coffee cake be named because the cook forgot the eggs and thought it would be a flop? Or was “flop” a corruption of the word “flap”, and could this have been an early breakfast recipe like flapjacks (pancakes) except without eggs? Webster’s dictionary says the first use of the word “flop” in America was 1728, a year after the Amish arrived.

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It’s November 25, 1783, and the last of the British troops leave New York City. Washing crosses the Harlem River and settles in Manhattan. This the Evacuation Day, the bookend to the Revolutionary War. I could describe it, but I swear my brain can’t process information regarding wars. Washington strutted his horse down Broadway and ate at Fraunces Tavern, supposedly eating this cake. Today the Tavern still stands, and is a historical landmark. If you ever visit New York City, it would be a interesting visit as it looks like the place is steeped in history and isn’t your normal tourist place (at least in NYC.) It even has a restaurant still open, but it is very much NOT vegan.

This cake is the first one for me to hit some roadblocks. Mostly because I wasn’t really thinking. I thought okay, replace the eggs, sub the butter, BAM DONE! I didn’t notice that there wasn’t any baking soda or powder. The cake would normally rise because it uses a creaming method that we see in pound cake- using sugar, butter, and eggs. Every vegan pound cake I’ve found uses baking soda or powder. I ended up with a cake that’s texture felt under baked.

So it was back to the drawing board. I tweaked the recipe, added baking powder or soda (I can’t remember now) and it still didn’t work. Yikes. I was getting really discouraged, although the flavor was really good. I was just trying to figure out how to balance the baking soda and oil with the existing recipe.

But then I made my Martha Washington Great Cake. The creaming method works with aquafaba! Amazing! I was over the moon from the news. I went back into the kitchen and pretty much just copied the cake from the book using the aquafaba, and wham bam! Done! No sweat what-so-ever! Crazy. But to add insult to injury, I re-read the description of the recipe, apparently an oil based recipe using baking soda has been floating around for years. In fact, you can try it right here, just sub the eggs.

So what makes this carrot cake (MY carrot cake) worth your time? Well, it is VERY different from most carrots cakes we eat today. Most modern carrot have a grated carrot in the mix, and almost always has cream cheese frosting. A style that is very American in it’s own right, and a recipe like this appears later in the book. But this cake uses boiled carrots that pureed, and folded into the batter. This gives the cake a beautiful color and flavor. Plus, Natalie Brown from Buzzfeed apparently fucking loves this cake.

I hope you take a chance on this cake as it is really yummy. Boiling and mashing 4 carrots take very little time, and it doesn’t need to be a perfect puree. And I specify Earth Balance butter since I am unsure how well this creaming method stands up to different styles.

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Soda and cake is a match made in heaven. Perhaps you were on a diet, and used it in a recipe with diet soda to cut down on calories from sugar? Maybe you were in college and only had soda instead of eggs on hand? Or we vegans know from PETA– you can use a can of soda in your cake instead of eggs. Now, YouTube is filled with “vegan cake mix hacks” videos but this drink is fairly old.

Nope- before cola and cake meant a drunk college girl is trying to make a cake with her new vegan phase it was known for two words. Church and the South. Yes, any respectable Southern woman would make a coke cake for their cake walks and Sunday socials (or whatever people make cakes for church functions.) Perhaps it is because Coca Cola is called Southern Champagne, or that the company is a heavy part of Atlanta’s identity.

Now you don’t have to use Coca Cola. You can use Pepsi, or perhaps any other cola out there. There are many “boutique” brands that make colas, at least in the United States. I strong recommend two things before buying. 1) Buy what you know you will drink. If you aren’t much of a soda fan, look around for a place you can buy one bottle. Doesn’t do you any good if you don’t want to drink the remaining 5 bottles that come in a six pack. 2) Avoid sugar-free versions. I made mine with diet store brand cola, and you could taste a hint of aspertaine in the cake. I am sure you would be able to taste the stevia in Zevia brand cola. But hey, go ahead and try it out. Why not?!

What are some fancy pants brands out there? Well, I always find that store-brands work just fine. But some organic and vegan options are Blue Sky, Jones, Maine Root, Boylan and Fentimens. And remember go nuts! Play around with sodas you find. Wanna try it with Birch Beer? Sounds good to me. Maybe Spruce? Or Sarsaparilla?! Maybe with that Chai Cola!? I don’t know, I don’t have time to make and EAT all this cake. But they all sound yummy to me.

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I can’t remember when my sister first made these. I remember I was near the end of college or was just out when my sister first made these. They were pretty simple, just crushed up oreos and cream cheese. I was pretty skeptical of them, but they were really yummy. She made them every christmas and birthday party for several years, but not so much anymore.

This recipe is fairly new, but dates earlier than 2009 when I got out of college. AllRecipes has a recipe for Oreo Truffles, and the earliest review I could find was 2003. It is clearly a favorite treat, there are over 800 reviews of the recipes. Most everyone loved the ease of the recipe, but complained that it was too sweet. All Recipe has a simple ingredients list, oreos, cream cheese, powdered sugar, and chocolate for coating.

It isn’t a surprise to see why people love this recipe. They are practically just a cake pop but made with a premade cookie. So they can easily be decorated and if you use white chocolate, the skies the limit. It is pretty easy to customize as well, just use mint oreos, or peanut butter. If you cut down on the cream cheese you just use the speciality flavors. Some people stuff cherries or marshmallows in the middle.

But I wanted to try and make this as accessible as possible to everyone. You can use ANY creme filled cookie sandwich that is vegan. Sorry to all the UK readers who don’t have vegan oreos. Store brands are fine, hydrox check, Newman O’s if your fancy. I also made a homemade “cream cheese” that is a mix of silken tofu and cashews. I made a special post the other day about it. I explain why in the post. But don’t worry, you can just use a container of tofutti if you really want to.

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This vegan mofo has been a little ambitious. So many sweets, so little time. I feel like I will have to eat salad for the next month to give my body a break from all the sugar. But many American recipes rely on some pantry staples. I’ve read so many recipes that use a container of cool-whip or a block of cream cheese.

Yes you can find vegan versions of these things, but I know for some international readers this implies paying a lot for imports. Or maybe you just don’t feel like shelling out $3+ for a container of cream cheese. And sometimes the homemade versions just don’t give the same texture.

So here I am sharing this quick little cream cheese recipe. It isn’t my favorite for a bagel topping, despite the photo, but it works perfectly in the recipes needed this month. All you need is a box of extra firm silken tofu, cashews, lemon juice, and apple cider vinegar. Super simple recipe.

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This is a cake I was very excited to try out. I never really had too many fruit cakes, but I found the photos very interesting. There was something very pretty about a pretty golden cake with lots of little berries baked inside. And there was also booze in the cake. I am always down with that. This cake has been altered quite a bit in the American Cakes cookbook. Many changes I am happy about, omitting the citron and lemon peels, and using white wine instead of the more heavy sweet fortified wines like brandy or madeira. Many online recipes also offer a frosting/icing to go on top of the cake, which I think it is too much. This is a rich dense cake, very similar to a pound cake with spiked fruit inside. I think it stands very well by itself.

This cake was made by Martha Washington– the first First Lady. She supposedly made this cake when George was returning home from serving as president, making it in time for Christmas. The recipe was written down by her Great Granddaughter Martha Parke Custis and is the main reason why the recipe still survives today.

Another thing that I liked from it’s modern adaptation is how much it has been scaled down. Part of the “great” in “great cake” is the sheer size. Readers of the blog might remember me describing the massive size of Election Cakes, and this cake was quite large as well.

Take 40 eggs & divide the whites from the yolks & beat them to a froth then work 4 pounds of butter to a cream & put the whites of eggs to it a spoon full at a time till it is well work’d then put 4 pounds of sugar finely powder’d to it in the same manner than put in the Youlks of eggs and 5 pounds of flower and 5 pounds of fruit, 2 hours will bake it add to it half an ounce of mace and nutmeg half a pint of wine & some fresh brandy.

I’ve even taken the size of the recipe down even further! The original recipe calls for a pound of currants, and I had to buy bulk organic currants. It wasn’t terribly expensive, but I found that the currants were quite old, and very dry. So they soaked up a LOT of wine. I later found that it was easier to find 10 oz boxes. The original recipe calls for a larger than normal loaf pan, so I figured I would scale the 16 oz currants to one box. I crunched the numbers and worked out well.

When I first baked the cake I replaced the butter for oil thinking that it would be dense enough to handle the softer texture. I added some baking soda to the mix for some rise, as the original recipe didn’t. And finally I replaced the eggs with aquafaba since the cake was light in color and I wanted to keep it flax fleck free. As I started to mix the aquafaba to the sugar-oil mix, I noticed it acting very similar to a pound cake. It made me wonder if I could skip the leavening agent all together.

So the second time making the cake was when I scaled down the size, and baked like a normal pound cake. I was VERY nervous. But it worked! Surprising I know! The photos might look like the cake is under baked, and it might of been just a smidge. I think I over soaked the currants (I did it overnight) making the cake a little too moist. But the texture was definitely cooked!

So here are some important notes about the ingredients. You will want a nice white wine. Pick something you would drink, but still have it be on the lower end of cost. I omitted the mace from the recipe, but it should traditionally be in there. I also used Earth Balance and specified it in the recipe. It worked for this, but I can not promise how homemade butters would work.

The oven is also on low and slow! This cake takes over 2 hours to bake! Plus 2 hours of soaking! This is going to take a loooong time to make, but very hands off. I hope this doesn’t scare off too many people, because this does make a great cake for the holiday season. One that might get people to question what they think of a “fruit cake.”

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It’s been a hot summer, and it really has been a damper on my desire to bake lots of cakes and pies. Ouch. But that doesn’t mean I wasn’t busy in the kitchen. Nope. I’ve just been busy exploring other parts of American desserts- candies. I am not a big candy maker, but I do have fond memories as a child of buttering my fingers and cutting hot sugar and rolling them into hard candies.

The first candy I was happy to feature on the blog doesn’t use melted sugar. It is a very simple candy to make, like most American candies, but has an ingredient that is unexpected- potato. I’ve made them twice before, once from a vegan recipe from Homestyle Vegan. I’ve simplified and more readily “veganized” the recipe today. But… let’s take a step back- What is a needham? Where are they from? And what’s the history?!

Well, a needham is made with sugar, coconut, mashed potatoes, and butter. They are cut into squares and coated in chocolate. If you are an American and never heard of this candy, chances are you haven’t been to the New England area, specifically Maine. This is a local treat that is kind-of overshadowed by lobster, blueberries, and whoopie pies for tourists. But many Maine natives have fond memories of the dessert.

This history of the Needhams. Like all candy it is shadowed in a bunch of folklore. One story tells about a priest who made the candies to increase church attendance. Another story tells about a candy maker who named the candy Needham after a popular evangelical priest in hopes to increase sales. If you need a non-priest storyline, supposedly one year there were “too many potatoes” for crops and a competition was set up to find new ways to eat them. And guess which recipe won- the needham of course! Most historians think most likely there WAS a competition, but it wasn’t because of a surplus of potatoes but because it was set up by a company that sold potatoes. The facts are that the earliest recipes for Needhams go as far back as 1926/1930

Regardless there is a little something about using potatoes in the candy. It does have some binding properties, making it so you don’t have to do any of the usual candy making heating. Some people claim it cuts down of the sweetness, but I think there is something to be said about the starchy texture in your mouth. If you have time to cover these gems in chocolate give this recipe a go! Don’t be like me who got tired towards the end and just poured the chocolate over the remaining candies. I didn’t include those in the pictures. lol

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I am a little embarrassed how long this recipe took to get up. I made it months ago, but them Vegan MOFO had a challenge for green. So I bumped up my priority to post that cocktail over this one. Then time just went by, then Wolfie switched to “one nap” and I just lost a large chunk of my alone time. So here I am FINALLY posting this.

So I mentioned in my previous cocktail that supposedly 70s cocktails are the new “it” thing. I am not sure about that, I am not one to keep up with trends (boozy or otherwise) but I always had a soft spot for white russians.

Yup- I can hear it. Your skepticism about my love of white russians. And I don’t blame you. Who wouldn’t think of The Dude, in his ragged jammies sloshing in dairy all willy-nilly in his glass. I think some of my favorite things about it is how simple it really is to make. And if you don’t have a creamer, well, you can just have a black russian.

Bum typical Millenial me, I can never just let this drink be. I need to switch things all over with my hipster garbage, even removing the “Russian” out of “White Russian,” and even taking away the “white” out of it. I can hear some old white man screaming “political correctness out of control!” I will admit, I like my recipe, but there isn’t much similar to the original inspiration.

So pretty much I had a bottle of creme de cacao and didn’t know what to do with it. I also had a bottle of Maca Mocha by Rebbl. I love this stuff, so many umami, rich, bitter, and chocolatey flavors. So I thought, why not mix cocoa liquor with cocoa drinks? You can easily sub this with any chocolate plant milk. I’ve done with chocolate ripple and chocolate soy milk, and both yummy.

Are you are wondering what type of creme de cacao do I use? You can easily find some that are vegan at your local liquor store. The creme isn’t for cream, but for the creamy texture from the sugar. You can see on barnivore, all “creme de cacao” are vegan, but the Godiva chocolate liquors ARE NOT VEGAN. And if you are wondering what the difference between “brown” and “white” creme de cacao, it is simply the color (which doesn’t make a difference with this drink.) Feel free to sub it with chocolate flavored vodka, especially if you don’t like your drinks too sweet.

The easy answer for the coffee part of this drink is to use Kahlua. They are vegan, so that is pretty easy. But I’ve been eyeing up this beautiful bottle of Grind Espresso Spirits. It is pretty much a hipster version of Kahlua, coffee flavored rum.

Sadly for my non-drinking readers, there isn’t any real “virgin” version of this drink. So I am sorry about that. But it is a really yummy drink for any chocolate and coffee lover.

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