Chocolate Fudge Cake

I know I've been neglecting the site recently, so I thought I'd start with a quick adaptation to save me writing out the recipe in full. This vegan chocolate fudge cake recipe from Sainsbury's Magazine was posted on Twitter yesterday. It's already milk, egg and soya free so with only one more thing  (wheat) to change, I thought I'd give it a go.

I know from experience, that unlike biscuit recipes you can't just do a straight swap for wheat free flour in cake. rather than just upping the fluid, I decided to reduce the quantity of flour as well. I still can't just follow a recipe, so I reduced the sugar too…

As it was an experiment, and I've recently had a bad experience with a blondie recipe, I just made half quantity. This was enough to fill an 18cm cake tin, which I cut in half before filling and icing.

I didn't have any avocado either (well, I did, but it's been lurking in the back of the fridge for so long, it really wasn't usable!) so haven't tried the icing. Mine was made with an apple and apricot fruit pot and the cake filled with apricot fruit spread. 

Amended ingredients:

1 small banana, or half a large one (mashed well) - mine was 47g

4 1/2 tbsp (75mls) Milk Substitute

2 1/2 tbsp (45mls) Vegetable Oil

120g Sugar (I still found this a bit sweet, despite using less than the original, would probably try with 100g next time)

1 tsp Vanilla Paste (or extract)

1 tsp Vinegar (I increased this as acid helps the rise in gluten  and egg free cakes)

25g Cocoa Powder (mixed with 75mls water)

175g Wheat Free Self Raising Flour

1/2 tbsp Baking Powder

35mls Maple Syrup

For method, please follow link

As it is a wetter mix, please adjust the cooking time by about 5 mins, or until it feels firm in the middle.

Green Tea Crackers

These are for Margreet, who very generously donated the Matcha Powder to experiment with. Green tea is high in antioxidants, but also contains caffeine so these may not be the ideal snack for your little cherub to eat in vast quantities, the odd one or 2 shouldn't be a problem (1 tsp of powder is enough for the equivalent of a cup of tea, this quantity of mix makes about 40 crackers - depending on size…). 

Mini Monster loves them, but I'm not sure he's the best judge as he will pretty much eat any carbohydrate (unless someone has touched it with 'wheat fingers'!). If you're not keen to try the green tea, just leave it out and make plain crackers.

2oz Gluten Free White Bread Flour (would probably work with gf plain flour too)

4oz Ground Almonds

1tsp Arrowroot or Kuzu 

1/4tsp Bicarbonate of Soda

1tsp Coconut Oil (room temperature so it's soft) or other oil

1tsp Matcha Green Tea Powder (or 2tsp if you want a stronger green tea taste)

50-60mls Lemon Juice or Water

Put dry ingredients in a bowl and mix well.

Add lemon juice (or water) and coconut oil.

Bring together with a knife.

Knead lightly until smooth ball formed.

Cover with cling film and flatten slightly with your hand.

Roll out (under cling film) until 2-3mm thick.

Cut into squares with a sharp knife (or use a biscuit cutter for different shapes).

Place on baking tray.

Bake at 180ºC for 15mins.

If they are not crisp enough put them back in the oven at 160ºC for another 10-15 mins