Coffee And Walnut Cake (Vegan and Gluten-Free)
This delicious coffee and walnut cake is both vegan and gluten-free (or can be made with gluten if you prefer). It is soft and moist, with a lovely coffee flavour, coffee buttercream and walnuts. It can also be made as a small batch 15cm cake, or a full sized 20cm one.
Servings 6 people
Ingredients
Cake:
- 150 g plain gluten-free flour blend
- 40 g ground almonds
- 10 g (1 packed Tablespoon) cornflour (cornstarch)
- ¾ teaspoon baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda (baking soda)
- ¼ teaspoon xanthan gum
- 1 ½ Tablespoons instant espresso powder
- pinch salt
- 60 g (¼ cup) vegan butter melted
- 60 ml (¼ cup) neutral oil
- 60 g (¼ cup) plain vegan yogurt
- 120 ml (½ cup) unsweetened non-dairy milk (I use soy)
- 140 g (1 + scant ¼ cup) caster sugar
- 1 teaspoon vinegar
- 1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract
- 65 g walnuts roughly chopped (plus extra to decorate)
Buttercream:
- 1 Tablespoon instant espresso powder
- 1 teaspoon milk
- 100 g (scant ½ cup) vegan block butter slightly softened
- 200 g (1 + ¾ cups) icing (powdered) sugar sifted
- ¼ teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180°C/160°C fan/350°F/gas mark 4. Grease two 15 cm (6 in) round cake tins, or one 20 cm (8 in) round, 5 cm (2 in) deep one and line the bases with baking parchment.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, ground almonds, cornflour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, xanthan gum, espresso powder and a pinch of salt.
- In a jug, whisk together the melted butter, oil, yogurt, milk, sugar, vinegar and vanilla extract.
- Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and stir with a balloon whisk until you have a smooth batter. Fold in the walnuts.
- Divide the batter evenly between the tins and bake for about 30 minutes until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.
- Leave the cakes to cool in the tins for 10 minutes then carefully turn them out onto a wire rack and leave to cool completely.
- To malke the buttercream, mix together the espresso powder and milk to form a paste.
- Whisk the butter with an electric mixer for a couple of minutes until fluffy. Add the icing sugar, coffee paste and vanilla extract.
- Stir until the sugar is moistened (the mixture will seem dry at first but will come together, don't be tempted to add any more liquid or it may split), then whisk on a high speed for a good few minutes until light and fluffy
- Place one of the cake layers on a plate and spread over half of the buttercream. Place the other cake layer on top, spread with the rest of the buttercream and decorate with walnuts.
Notes
- I have not provided US cup conversions for the flour as they are too inaccurate for this recipe. Different gluten-free flour blends weigh different amounts per cup. Please use a scale.
- To make a two layer 20 cm (8 in) round cake you will need to double the recipe.
- To make this cake with regular flour rather than gluten-free, swap both the gluten-free flour and the ground almonds for an equal weight of plain (all-purpose) flour; so a total of 190g of plain flour. Omit the xanthan gum.