Vegan courgette cake with lemon glaze - this easy, one-bowl, eggless and dairy-free courgette cake (zucchini cake) is moist, lemony and lightly spiced and is a great way of using up seasonal gluts.
This vegan courgette cake is a great, easy bake to use up a few courgettes if you have been blessed with a glut of them. Or just because you want a delicious cake to snack on that also has some hidden veg in it.
It is a lovely moist cake due to the grated courgette; because it is quite a bland vegetable the flavour doesn't really come through at all, it just provides a nice texture. Plenty of lemon zest and juice and some cinnamon and ginger give the cake a delicious zingy, lightly spiced flavour, kind of similar to a carrot cake.
It is a perfect light, teatime cake that isn't overly sweet so it is great for snacking, or even for breakfast! The courgette keeps it moist so it will last well for about four days in an airtight container.
How To Make Vegan Courgette Cake:
(For ingredients and full instructions see the recipe card below)
*For the best results make sure that you follow the recipe closely. As always, I highly recommend using the gram measurements (with a digital scale), rather than the cup conversions. Cup measurements are simply not accurate enough for baking and I cannot guarantee the best results if you use them.*
Start by coarsely grating a couple of courgettes. Place the grated flesh in a clean tea towel over the sink and squeeze out most of the excess moisture.
Tip the squeezed courgette into a large bowl and add lemon zest, light brown soft sugar (brown sugar helps to give the cake flavour), caster sugar, sunflower oil (or you can use another flavourless oil), non-dairy milk and lemon juice. Whisk until it is all well combined.
Add plain flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, cinnamon, ginger and salt and stir through until no dry lumps remain.
Tip the batter into a lined loaf tin and bake for about 70 minutes, until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Leave to cool in the tin then top with lemon glaze.
Tips:
- There is no need to peel the courgettes, the skin is very nutritious.
- Be sure to use the coarse side of the grater to grate the courgettes; they will be too mushy if you use a fine grater.
- Make sure that you squeeze the excess moisture out of the grated courgette so you don't end up with a soggy cake.
- You can substitute the courgette for marrow.
- Swap the lemon zest and juice for lime if you prefer.
Courgette Or Zucchini?!:
Either! Courgette and zucchini are the same thing; courgette is the British name and zucchini is the North American.
You can also use marrow instead, which is mature courgette.
Can I Freeze Vegan Courgette Cake?:
Yes, this cake freezes well, either whole or in individual slices.
More Vegan Vegetable Cakes:
- Vegan carrot cake loaf
- Pumpkin chocolate chip cake bars
- Vegan beetroot chocolate cake with chocolate avocado frosting
- Vegan pumpkin cake with maple pecans and cinnamon buttercream
- Sweet potato bread with pecan streusel
- Vegan gluten-free sweet potato chocolate chip cake
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Vegan Courgette Cake
Ingredients
Courgette Cake:
- 350 g (12.3 oz) courgette (zucchini) (about 2 medium)
- finely grated zest of 2 lemons
- 100 g (½ cup + 1 Tbsp) light brown soft sugar
- 80 g (⅓ cup + 1 Tbsp) caster sugar
- 120 ml (½ cup) sunflower oil
- 60 ml (¼ cup) unsweetened non-dairy milk (I used soy)
- 60 ml (¼ cup) lemon juice
- 260 g (2 cups + 2 Tbsp) plain (all-purpose) flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon ground ginger
- ½ teaspoon salt
Lemon Glaze:
- 85 g (⅔ cup) icing (powdered) sugar
- juice of ½ lemon
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/gas mark 4. Grease an approx 11.5 x 21.5 cm / 4.5 x 8.5 in loaf tin and line with a strip of baking parchment. Make sure that you leave some overhanging on either side so that you can lift the cake out easily.
- Coursely grate the courgette and place the grated flesh in a clean tea towel over the sink. Firmly squeeze out most of the excess water. Weigh the leftover flesh, you should have about 240g left.
- Place the grated courgette in a large bowl along with the lemon zest, light brown soft sugar, caster sugar, sunflower oil, milk and lemon juice.
- Whisk until well combined.
- Add the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, cinnamon, ginger and salt. Stir until no dry lumps remain.
- Working quickly, tip the batter into the prepared loaf tin, spread it level and place in the preheated oven.
- Bake for about 70 minutes until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Leave to cool in the tin.
- Once the cake is cool, sift the icing sugar into a bowl and gradually stir in the lemon juice until you have a thick but pourable glaze.
- Drizzle the glaze over the top of the cake and serve. Store in an airtight container for up to four days.
Notes
- For the best results make sure that you follow the recipe closely. As always, I highly recommend using the gram measurements (with a digital scale), rather than the cup conversions. Cup measurements are simply not accurate enough for baking and I cannot guarantee the best results if you use them
- There is no need to peel the courgettes, the skin is very nutritious.
- Be sure to use the coarse side of the grater to grate the courgettes; they will be too mushy if you use a fine grater.
- Make sure that you squeeze the excess moisture out of the grated courgette so you don't end up with a soggy cake.
- You can substitute the courgette for marrow.
- Swap the lemon zest and juice for lime if you prefer.
Paula
Hi Hannah! this looks really nice! I just have one question if that’s ok? Is the 350g courgette after the moisture has been squeezed out or before? Thank you!
hannahhossack
Hi Paula, Thank you! It's 350g before squeezing; there should be about 240g left once you have squeezed the liquid out. I hope you enjoy it!
Vanessa
Hi! The recipe sounds great, I'm just wondering if I can substitute the brown sugar for another type of sugar. Light brown soft sugar is not always easy to come by in Austrian supermarkets:).
Greetings from Vienna!
hannahhossack
Hi Vanessa, yes, any kind of sugar will work fine (except liquid ones).
Janet
Hi Vanessa
You can make your own brown sugar with granulated sugar and a tablespoon of molasses or black treacle, just put them in a bowl and mix together. It does take a fair bit of time but you can speed it up a bit by using an electric hand mixer. For a darker brown sugar use more molasses. I hope that helps.
A
Tried this today and it came out so beautifully and so tasty. I followed the ingredients and recipe completely apart from I only had a smidge left of cinnamon and I also saved a little bit of zest to sprinkle on top of the icing and I weighed using digital scales and actually weight the post-drained courgette just to get as accurate as possible. It was really so tasty I'm chuffed and will make this again.
Eve
Probably the best tasting cake I have ever made!
Alexandra
Hi I’m just about to make this as it looks delicious and easy- we are about to get a courgette glut - I wonder would currants or walnuts be ok to add ? Thanks!
hannahhossack
Hi Alexandra, yes that would be fine. I hope you enjoy it!
Naomi B
Hi, would love to try this today, but I only have one courgette. Could I top up with grated carrot to make up the 240g vegetable flesh or would this affect the texture?
hannahhossack
Hi Naomi, I think that should work fine 🙂
Martha
I made this for a garden party and although people were suspicious, as it was made from a vegetable (courgette) - it went down amazingly 🙂
Rachael Eyton
I used this recipe to make cupcakes as I didn't have a loaf tin and they turned out perfectly! Made about 16, baked for 20-25 minutes and they are delicious!
Jessica
Absolutely delicious! I don’t make cakes often, but I had courgettes that needed using and I wanted something sweet...and this came out perfectly. Very tasty, light but moist, it was super easy to make too and I had every ingredient already in my cupboards. Thanks for sharing, I will make this again.
Nikki Kerley
Can I cook this in an 8inch round tin?
Hannah
Hi Nikki, I think it would be too much batter for an 8 inch tin, unless you used two of them. If you have a 9in square tin I reckon that would work well.
Catherine Hoyt
This cake is so delicious and light and fluffy
Renata
Thank you very much for the inspiration. I wanted to make a cake for my vegan colleagues and this was an absolute success, even for the non-vegan colleagues!
The only thing i did differently, I didnt have any milk, so instead I simply didnt squeeze the courgette and kept the juices in. I also thought what a waste to squeeze all the nutrients! When I was mixing the butter, it appeared rather dry first but as I was crushing the courgette pieces with my spatula it gradually released all the lovely juices. The cake turned our really nice, moist but not soggy so I thought I'd put this out there as another alternative 🙂
Brigitte
Thank you for your comment , I am making the bread today some recipes do not squeeze the zucchini a they don’t add other liquid! Very smart and beneficial to keep the juice of the zucchini …
Krystal McCann
This cake is absolutely delicious!! Really easy to make, I actually used an 8 inch cake tin and adjusted the time to 60 mins and it was perfect. My whole family loved this cake (including two small children), and it didn’t last long! Thank you so much. X
Fiona Inley
I love this recipe! I have had to adapt to vegan cooking over the past few months, and wanted to find a dairy free alternative to my go-to Marrow, pecan and maple cake. This is is. It's just as delicious. I have tweaked the recipe by using the zest and juice of an orange, and added 100g chopped pecans. Delicious. Thank you for sharing!
Joan
Although I whisked all my ingredients together the cake came out lovely. Would definitely try this again.
Kay-Leigh Butler
Thank you very much for sharing your recipes. I made this one at the weekend and it really is delicious! Can't wait to try out some of your other recipes!
CHARLOTTE
Delicious, I made it using a marrow instead and it's equally as good!
Lauren
Our friend gifted us a massive courgette (about 18 courgettes worth!) so naturally had to make a cake with some. This was divine and my family loved it too, The spice works perfectly with the lemon, thanks for the recipe 🙂
Kathryn Shaw
Great tasting, great texture and flavour! I'm not vegan but honestly this is probably weird to say, I love it when I succeed in making a really tasty vegan recipe, magic. Thank you
Eileen Nolan
This was such a tasty cake! I was a little bit doubtful as I used more marrow than courgette, but it didn't matter. Thanks!
Jill
Hi hannah,
Thank you for a great recipe! Mine turned out slightly oily (taste was ). Could this have been for any reason? Or if I use less oil next time will it affect the rise?
hannahhossack
Hi Jill, hmm, I'm not sure why that would be. As it is such a moist cake I think that you could probably get away with reducing the oil to 80ml (1/3 cup).
Janet
I made this lovely cake gluten free by using 100gm ground almonds and 160gm gluten free flour with a bit of xanthan gum. It was delicious.
GK
Hi how can I make this gluten free?
Hannah
Hi, I haven't tried making this gluten free but I think that it would work ok using a gluten free flour blend.
Dipali
Hi. The recipe looks awesome. Can I use dairy milk issues of soya milk?
Hannah
Hi Dipali, sure.
Melon
A real find!
Mandy
Would there enough mixture to make this as a 2 layer cake with vegan buttercream in the middle.
Hannah
Hi Mandy, I think there would be enough for two 18cm layers, I think that 20cm ones might be a bit thin.
Pre
Delicious! It's worth weighing the grated courgette after squeezing out the water. I took some out as I couldn't get it down to the recommended weight. I guess courgettes vary in water content.
Tracy H
For someone who is pretty rubbish at baking this the most amazing tasting cake and so easy to make. Even my son who is a bit dubious about some of my vegan and vegetarian offerings absolutely loved it as does everyone who has tried it. I’ve made it numerous times now and it is always a hit, thank you so much for sharing xx