Guest guest Posted July 30, 2007 Report Share Posted July 30, 2007 Robin and all, The recipe for the vegan cake I usually make for " omnivore " gatherings actually depends on a cake mix that we have in supermarkets in Brazil. It has become my fallback when it just HAS to come out right. My experience with vegan cake recipes from scratch is that sometimes the texture is cakey, and often they don't fall, but the success rate is not 100%. (With the exception of Erin Pavlina's choc. cake recipe--works every time.) Also, vegan soy margarine appropriate for culinary use doesn't exist in Brazil, so I have to depend on veg. oil. The cake mix that I discovered just happens to be vegan--it has white flour, sugar,corn starch, baking powder, baking soda, vanilla and salt (and is not overly sweet, nor does it have any shortening). So this recipe will work if you have a similar product in the US. Here's what I do. For the milk, 3 eggs and 5T margarine called for in the instructions, I substitute and throw in to the blender: 1/2 C soymilk 1/4 C tofu 1 big carrot (cut into slices) or 1 big banana (in pieces) 1 T ground flaxseed + 3 T water or soymilk (or twice this amount if you leave out the tofu) 5 T veg. oil (corn oil for a more buttery flavor, canola or sunflower to be healthier) Blend all this well. The dry ingred. from the cake mix will be in a big bowl, and to this I add: 1 1/2 t baking powder 1/2 to 3/4 C raw wheat germ Add blender mixture to dry ingred. and beat well (by hand or cake mixer). Add 1/4 to 1/2 C vegan choc. chips to batter, mix just to distribute chips and bake acording to instructions on the box (one half hour for this one). This cake can be ready in about 50 minutes when you get fast at it. The chocolate frosting is just as easy: About 2 T soymilk in very small pan, and in it melt 2 T sugar on very low heat, turn off heat and add 3/4 C vegan chips, stirring until melted and smooth. (Ours are very un-sweet chips. You might not even need the extra sugar, depending on your chips.) For kids, sometimes I even decorate with gumdrops or colored sprinkles--vegan of course. Has been a success every time! Lynnea robin koloms <rkoloms wrote: will you please post the recipe? Lynnea Hansen Nascimento <lynnea_hansen wrote: Paige, Missie and all, I've also had success with exposing our friends to good vegan food--my friend's son loved a vegan cake I had made, and when his birthday rolled around, I offered to make the cake (which of course meant it would be a party where my boys would be able to eat the cake!). Even knowing they'd have only about 20 guests, I made a cake to feed an army, so everyone could just eat as much as they wanted. It was a huge success, lots of people asked for the recipe, and the other day my friend brought over vegan cake for our children! Even the parents who inicially didn't ask for the recipe have had to learn how to make it, because their kids bugged them so much to have it at home. (And it's loaded with good stuff--ground flaxseeds, wheat germ, carrots, tofu, soymilk...) But as far as the kids could see, it was just a vanilla cake with chocolate chips and chocolate frosting. And there were no vegetarians of any kind in the group, all omnivores. Real friends, in our experience, have always reacted well to our being vegan, and in Brazil, we are in an even tinier minority than you lucky US vegans... Lynnea Missie Ward <mszzzi wrote: Paige, This sounds like a really fun idea. We may have to have a party just to do something like this. It's nifty,and everyone gets to do something new - it's fabulous! Missie On 7/28/07, Paige <gosstucker wrote: > > Tonia, > > I am a little backlogged on email can you tell? But I wanted to > respond. In our home right now we are vegan and do not bring meat or dairy > into the house. For houseguests we make sure our friends are aware of > this, > but we try to make it fun and unconventional when they come over so our > friends don't compare it to other dinners. We always do a tapas or > appetizer event. So we call our friends and let them pick the theme: > Italian, French, Japanese, Thai, Greek, Lebanese, Spanish, etc. then we > research vegan dishes and make appetizer portions of tons of different > foods. It is fun for me and my son to cook together (we usually do this > while my husband works nights).. Then when our guests come over we have > music to go with the theme that we have downloaded usually off iTunes. We > have candles and drinks that fit the food. > > It lets our friends experience something new and us too. It > also is great because our friends don't feel pressure to eat a whole > portion > of something they don't like not to offend us. They can take a little bit > of each item and then go back for what they like, leave off what they > don't > and feel good about the whole experience. We often think of things from > our > perspective because we are the minority, but my friends have said it can > be > tense if you think the food tastes really bad but you don't want to offend > a > veggie friend.. this takes off some of the pressure of a big dish. It also > makes it fun and different for all of us. I really encourage you to try > it, > our friends try and get us to host the dinners most often because they > like > it so much. and now when we go out to their houses, for example, July 4 > our > friends had a bbq. Everyone brought a dish we could eat.. there was so > much > there I could not believe it.. our making it fun for our friends has > opened > their eyes and their pallets and they are much more aware and considerate > when we are out at their houses. I no longer even have to bring food we > can > eat.. there are ALWAYS vegan dishes at our friends events, it is so nice! > > Paige > > _____ > > <%40> [ > <%40>] On > Behalf Of littlemomma0104 > Sunday, July 22, 2007 7:39 PM > <%40> > Re: non-vegetarian dinner guests > > @gro <% <%25> > 40> ups.com, > > " vegton " <vegton wrote: > > > > How do you all handle your non-vegetarian dinner guests? My > husband > > and I avoid having dinner guests because we disagree on how the > meal > > should be handled. I say, since we're vegetarians we shouldn't > serve > > meat, but he says that since most of our friends always make sure > we > > have something to eat we should make sure they have something to > eat. > > We have friends that have flat out told us " something has to die in > > order for me to consider it a meal. " > > > > So, since we disagree on this we just don't have people over for > food > > or when we do we order out (I still don't like meat being in our > house, > > but we don't pay for it.) > > > > I think it's totally different from them making sure we have > something > > to eat and us making sure they have something to eat (apparently > > they'll starve if there's no meat) because of our beliefs. They > aren't > > opposed to pasta and vegetables!! > > > > Tonia > > > I agree with you 100% No one ever died from eating string beans. I > always think bean burritos with all the fixings are also a great safe > way to go. I say stick to your guns, if they do not like the menu > then they can eat dessert! heheheh. > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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