About 30 years ago my father introduced me to Patricia, the most glamorous woman I’d ever seen. She wore a light blue polyester pantsuit with eyeshadow to match and had a pile of perfectly coiffed blond hair. She was lovely and clearly not from Connecticut, where we lived at the time.
Just one word from her mouth and you could hear the south, Alabama in fact. Patricia is my stepmother and in honor of her Southern roots I made her a Red Velvet Birthday cake. Her mom used to make them for her when she was a kid. I wish I had her mother’s recipe, but I found one that was fascinating and dated back to WWII. The milk chocolate cream cheese frosting done in an elegant basket weave adds to the romance of the cake.
When I read the ingredients for the cake I immediately assumed that it had omitted a key ingredient: eggs. In fact, this cake is completely vegan; no eggs, butter or milk. Eggs act as a binder, a kind of glue that holds things together. When they are baked, the proteins set and hold everything else in place. So when I saw that this cake didn’t have any at all I wondered what the texture would be like, paste came to mind. In fact, I was so doubtful I had a back up recipe all ready to go. But, what do you know, it was fantastic. Moist, rich, despite the lack of any butter or eggs and absolutely delicious. Why?
Created during a time when things like eggs and butter were hard to come by, this cake relies strictly on the gluten (protein) in the all-purpose flour to create the structure. The water in the recipe interacts with the proteins in the flour, with a little help from acid (lemon juice, cocoa powder) and some salt to work its magic. Both the acid and salt give the protein a little boost of strength and it all comes together in a truly remarkable cake. It gets its rise and lightness from just a touch of baking soda, no baking powder at all. The soda interacts with the acid and produces carbon dioxide bubbles. Essentially, you are making your own baking powder; baking soda + acid. Ok, maybe that is more food science than you wanted, but it is absolutely fascinating, at least to me!
Vegan Red Velvet Cake
From Something Warm from the Oven: Baking Memories, Making Memories
To make the cake:
preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and then line the bottoms of two 8-inch round cake pans with parchment.
Place the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda and salt in a food processor, and let it whir to combine for about 30 seconds.
In a separate bowl, whisk together 2 cups of cold water, the oil, vanilla, food coloring and lemon juice.
Pour the wet ingredients over the dry ingredients and whir in food processor until blended.
Pour the batter into the prepared pans and firmly tap the pans against the counter several times to release any air bubbles.
bake for 25-35 minutes, or until tester comes out clean. Cool the cakes on a rack before inverting them.
To make the Milk Chocolate icing:
Melt the chocolate over a double boiler, remove from heat and allow to cool to room temperature.
Beat the butter until soft and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add cream cheese and beat for another 2-3 minutes, scraping down the side of the bowl several times, to make sure there are no lumps. Blend in the lemon juice. Add the cooled chocolate and the confectioner’s sugar. Beat on medium low speed until spreading consistency.
To decorate the cake:
Start by setting the cake on a cardboard round, centering it on a Cake Stand and trimming off the top of the cake layers. You trim them if they are domed or just to remove the outer layer, which is often a different texture. It makes a great snack while your working.
Put a large amount of icing on the top of the cake. It should be about 1/4-inch thick when spread over the entire surface of the top.
Spread the icing out with a Spatula so that it is completely covers the top and is level, it should overhang the edge by about 1/4-inch. Flat, not smooth, is the goal.
Now you want to cover the sides with icing. Again, you are just trying to get it covered, don’t worry about smoothing it out until all the cake is completely covered.
Now you want to smooth out the sides. Hold the spatula straight up and down, but at a 20 degree angle away from the cake. If the spatula is flat against the cake you will end up scraping all of the icing off. At this point you never move the spatula, just turn the cake stand and the spatula will run over the surface of the cake. You are not applying any pressure, just hold it steady and it will gradually smooth out the surface.
Once the sides are as smooth as you want, then you do the same thing on the top. Start on one side of the cake and gently smooth out the surface, stopping midway. rotate the cake and continue until the cake top is smooth.
To create the basket weave you will need two pastry bags. One fitted with a Ateco round tip (#7) and the other with a basket Ateco basket weave tip (#47).
Start with the round tip and create a straight line up and down. With the basket tip pipe 1-inch lines across the original straight line. Separate them with the width of the basket weave tip.
Using the round tip draw another up and down line directly over the ends of the 1-inch basket weave. Using the basket weave tip, start by tucking the tip under the straight line, so that the piping looks as if it is coming out from under that line. Then pipe 1-inch basket weave in the spaces that were left open.
Repeat this over and over until you have gone all the way around the cake.
I finished the top off with a very simple star tip pattern on top and some pansies from my garden!
Ingredients
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 cups sugar
- 1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
- 2 tsp baking soda
- 3/4 tsp salt
- 2 cups cold water
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil
- 1 tbsp vanilla extract
- 2-3 tbsp Red Food Color Link: https://amzn.to/3KgxVjs
- 2 tbsp lemon juice
Cream Cheese Frosting (Not Vegan)
- 12 oz milk chocolate
- 1 stick unsalted butter, softened
- 16 oz cream cheese
- 2 tbsp lemon juice
- 2 1/4 cups sited confectioner's sugar
Instructions
To Make the Cake
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and then line the bottoms of two 8-inch round cake pans with parchment.
- Place the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda and salt in a food processor, and let it whir to combine for about 30 seconds.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together 2 cups of cold water, the oil, vanilla, food coloring and lemon juice.
- Pour the wet ingredients over the dry ingredients and whir in food processor until blended.
- Pour the batter into the prepared pans and firmly tap the pans against the counter several times to release any air bubbles.
- Bake for 25-35 minutes, or until tester comes out clean. Cool the cakes on a rack before inverting them.
To Make The Icing
- Melt the chocolate over a double boiler, remove from heat and allow to cool to room temperature.
- Beat the butter until soft and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add cream cheese and beat for another 2-3 minutes, scraping down the side of the bowl several times, to make sure there are no lumps. Blend in the lemon juice. Add the cooled chocolate and the confectioner’s sugar. Beat on medium low speed until spreading consistency.
To Decorate
- Start by setting the cake on a cardboard round, centering it on a Cake Stand and trimming off the top of the cake layers. You trim them if they are domed or just to remove the outer layer, which is often a different texture. It makes a great snack while your working.
- Put a large amount of icing on the top of the cake. It should be about 1/4-inch thick when spread over the entire surface of the top.
- Spread the icing out with a Spatula so that it is completely covers the top and is level, it should overhang the edge by about 1/4-inch. Flat, not smooth, is the goal.
- Now you want to cover the sides with icing. Again, you are just trying to get it covered, don’t worry about smoothing it out until all the cake is completely covered.
- Now you want to smooth out the sides. Hold the spatula straight up and down, but at a 20 degree angle away from the cake. If the spatula is flat against the cake you will end up scraping all of the icing off. At this point you never move the spatula, just turn the cake stand and the spatula will run over the surface of the cake. You are not applying any pressure, just hold it steady and it will gradually smooth out the surface.
- Once the sides are as smooth as you want, then you do the same thing on the top. Start on one side of the cake and gently smooth out the surface, stopping midway. rotate the cake and continue until the cake top is smooth.
- To create the basket weave you will need two pastry bags. One fitted with a Ateco round tip (#7) and the other with a basket Ateco basket weave tip (#47).
- Start with the round tip and create a straight line up and down. With the basket tip pipe 1-inch lines across the original straight line. Separate them with the width of the basket weave tip.
- Using the round tip draw another up and down line directly over the ends of the 1-inch basket weave. Using the basket weave tip, start by tucking the tip under the straight line, so that the piping looks as if it is coming out from under that line. Then pipe 1-inch basket weave in the spaces that were left open.
- Repeat this over and over until you have gone all the way around the cake.
Happy Birthday Nana (Patricia)! xo Z
We have always called the red velvet cakes “Hereford” cake, after the red and white cattle, but then we lived on a ranch and raised them. I’ll have to pull out my mom’s old recipe to see if that is egg free and the chocolate cream cheese frosting is very intruiging.
Lovely cake! You did a great job!! Looks really yummy!
This is gorgeous. Absolutely gorgeous.
oh wow look at that! simply wonderful Zoe, you really are a craftswoman.
beautiful zoe!
Beautiful…just perfect for that Birthday cake for a special person:).
Love the basket weaves..:)
If your stepmother doesn’t realize how much you like her, I’m sure the basket weave drove it home!
Great backstory for the recipe, too. 🙂
You know what’s funny? When I was doing small scale catering, it was mostly cakes, and a lot of basket weave requests too! Can you find one cake on my blog? Just one, a The DB caramel! It’s so odd, since it was something I did ALL the time and loved!
Anyway, my basket weaves never looked as good as yours. That’s pure perfection, and a gorgeous, gorgeous cake. LOVE the photos too, but that’s a given with you 🙂
I love the basket weave on this cake! Patricia is lucky to have such an amazing stepdaughter!
about all i can say is wow. i am speechless.
What a perfect, beautiful cake!! Stunning!
yr cake is gorgeous! your piping is just perfect. must be really delicious. thanks for the recipe, will try it one day.
i love red velvet and i’m totally in awe of your basket weaving piping!! that’s just out of this world. 🙂 you’re an inspiration x
Hi, I loved reading about your cake. I never had a chocolate one. We call them here in Mississippi, Italian cream cheese cake ( icing uses cream cheese, and cake is red velvet. I have your bread book and one day you stopped by
my blog. I love to do an interview on you on my blog. I love your blog so much. And your book! Should you find time in between baking.
Yay! Thanks for giving vegan cakes a good reputation!
Lovely recipe, thanks for posting, will try it.
amazin.to make it:))..love the whole learning….process….love to make it
Yum! Your basketweave is beautiful.
-Barb
I’d never even heard of Red Velvet cake until a couple of years ago but I’ve been wanting to try it ever since. The basket weave is amazing.It looks too beautiful to eat. You must have the patience of a saint. I don’t think I’d even want to try that part.
Hi Sharon,
Thanks! I was so mystified by this cake that I followed the directions exactly, which is VERY rare for me.
It would be my inclination to bake it in a 9×3 pan, but I wonder if the cake has enough get up and go to withstand the extra weight.
My brother, who is a vegan, is coming to town soon and I’m going to make him this cake. I’ll try it in a 9×3 pan and let you know how it works.
Zoë
Loved the write up, first part read like an interesting novel.
The info on the food science behind was superb.
You can make it in a 9 inch by 3 inch cake pan w/o compromising on the texture of the cake, right?
Ok dear friend, this one I gotta try….this family is nuts about Red Velvet Cake that our daughter chose it for her wedding cake (we live in the South!) and it was baked by an award winning baker (so I obviously don’t have the recipe)….yours looks so fantastic. I can’t wait. Do stop by sometime if you have a second. I’m adding your blog! Roz
It was absolutely scrumptious! and as gorgeous as it looks. Zoe is superb!
Yummy yummy yummy! Red velvet is my favorite! I’m gonna make this for my birthday come September!
What a beautiful work of art! I did enjoy the food science, as well 🙂