Sweet potato chocolate cake
Sweet potato chocolate cake
Happy weekend, guys! Ours has been a roller coaster of emotions so far and there is more to come, I’m sure. We finally got our house keys yesterday and were able to go back to OUR (still doesn’t feel like it) house to check it out, measure things and ponder the best course of action.
The house looked really weird without any furniture in it and even though we knew this would happen, it freaked us out a little as it exposed a lot of small niggles that were hiding behind things and also made the place look much smaller. Well, we’ve seen it with all the furniture in it, so unless the house shrunk with the economy in anticipation of Brexit 😉 , it’s all good – we will be able to fit all the necessary furniture items in comfortably.
After we’ve been able to take a closer look at the place, it suddenly dawned on us how much work lies ahead of us. It’s exciting and also slightly daunting and overwhelming at the same time. Luckily, we’ll have no spare cash for a while so that very much informs our next steps. Big expensive things like putting a new floor in or modernizing the kitchen will have to wait until we bounce back a little. So to begin with, we’ve decided to tackle the smallest room in the house – the study. It’s currently painted a ghastly lilac and the walls have plenty of screw holes in them, so that’s the room we are going to cut our teeth on. We want to put a nice floor in there too, but that will have to wait until we are ready to purchase the floor for the entire level.
Next on the DIY list is the living room, which requires some serious wallpaper stripping, prepping and painting of the walls, ripping the carpet off and getting rid of some antiquated inbuilt cupboards. These two rooms should keep us occupied for a few months and then we will see. I’m trying to fight my usual instinct to think about everything that needs doing all at once, as that only ever leaves me overwhelmed, stressed, drained and ineffective. It’s going to be a shambles for a while. We have some guests coming in April and then in June and there is a real chance that we will need to eat our meals cross-legged on the floor, but they’ve been warned and they do not seem that bothered.
I actually quite like DIY (I may be singing from a different song sheet a few months from now) as it involves a lot of learning and attention to detail and the results are immensely fulfilling. So our plan is to do as much as we can ourselves and only just hire professionals for things like kitchen installation, plastering, electrics etc.
While all this house-related excitement has been going on, I still somehow managed to finalise a chocolate cake recipe, which I think you’ll want to get your mitts on… It’s deeply chocolatey, delicious and indulgent, yet both the cake itself and the buttercream are based on a vegetable. Yes, that’s right. They utilise a sweet potato, but like Duncan, our neighbour and a few other people who got to try it, you would never have guessed. It’s delicious on its own, but for an extra special treat and a great balance of flavours, I like to serve it with a dollop of thick coconut yoghurt and a spoonful of cherry compote. Enjoy, while I shall get back to reading up on Victorian house renovation.
- 110 g / ½ cup HOT mashed cooked sweet potato*
- 100 g / 3.5 oz vegan dark chocolate (I used 70% cacao), chopped roughly
- 3 tbsp maple syrup or plant milk
WET INGREDIENTS
- 110 g / ½ cup mashed cooked sweet potato*
- 360 ml / 1½ cup almond milk (or other thin plant milk)
- 120 ml / ½ cup smooth hazelnut or almond butter
- 200 g / 1 cup sugar (I used coconut sugar for refined sugar free version)
DRY INGREDIENTS
- 180 g / 1½ cups all purpose wheat flour or GF all purpose flour mix (I use this one)
- 75 g / ¾ cup cacao powder
- 1 tsp of baking powder
- ½ tsp of baking soda
- ¼ tsp fine sea salt
- Place ½ cup of hot sweet potato in a food processor together with roughly chopped chocolate. Process until all the chocolate has melted and you get a smooth frosting.
- Taste and add maple syrup if you feel that the mixture lacks sweetness (depends on how sweet your chocolate is and on your preference). If not using maple syrup, add almond milk to achieve a more spreadable consistency. Transfer to a bowl and set aside.
CAKE
- Warm up the oven to 180° C / 355° F and line a 900 g / 2 lb cake tin with baking paper. Move the oven rack a notch down from the middle position.
- Process ½ cup of sweet potato in the food processor with ½ cup of almond milk. Once smooth, add the remaining wet ingredients and whizz until smooth. Transfer to a large bowl. If you don’t have a food processor, you could probably mash sweet potato with a fork by adding a splash of almond milk (from the amount of milk the recipe calls for) to get a smooth puree before adding the remaining wet ingredients. If you do use a food processor, make sure you scrape all of the wet mixture that stays on the lid, blade etc. using a spatula so that the ratio of wet to dry ingredients remains correct.
- Sift all the dry ingredients into another bowl and mix well until thoroughly combined.
- Add dry ingredients to the wet ones in three batches, folding well each time. Fold gently with a spatula until there is no dry flour left, but do not overmix (that’s important if you are using a flour containing gluten)!
- Transfer the cake batter into the prepared baking tin. It should be thick.
- Bake for about 55-60 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. Remove from the oven and allow it to cool down completely before applying the icing.
I used a 2 lb / 900 g cake tin of the following dimensions: 18.5cm x 8cm x 6cm. (I used one like this). It holds 8 cups / 2000 ml liquid (to the brim), but the batter should fill no more than 2/3 – 3/4 of the 2lb cake tin or else the cake may not raise.
This recipe is adapted from my earlier recipe for chocolate chilli muffins.
If there was a nobel prize for vegan baking I would give it to you for the sweet potato frosting!! It is incredible, you cannot tell the difference at all!! I constantly kept sampling it to check for an aftertaste but there was none. My son loathes sweet potato but cannot have dairy, he inhaled the frosting. It refrigerates really well. Thank you. You made my son very happy. I will have to take the sweet potato secret to my grave. lol
Love,
Dalia
Thanks for the review and I am glad you enjoyed it. This cake certainly isn't dry unless overbaked - potato puree and nut butter provides a lot of moistness - and it has had lots of raving reviews. It is difficult for me to comment as you did make some substantial changes and cake recipes are quite precise. I hope your next try will be more to your liking. x Ania
Yes on the substitution (full disclosure: I haven't tested it but I'm pretty sure). This cake is not meant to be dry, but I suppose you could dry it out by baking it for a little longer. Good luck if you do decide to try. Ania
I provide both metric and US cup/oz measurements side by side to cater for everybody. 200 g raw sweet potato equals ½ cup cooked and mashed (approx. 110g once cooked) and this is how much you need for the cake and the same amount again if you are planning on making the icing too. Hope this helps! Ania
I have not tried, but they should work in a similar manner. Feels like maybe potato has lower water content though so that's something to be aware of although it won't make a massive difference, possibly require longer baking time. Hope this helps! Ania
Yes, it does! Hope that helps! Ania
Glad to hear you made it and I hope you'll enjoy it! I am not sure as I don't really count calories, but I suspect so. Depends what specific recipe you compare it to, of course. Ania
Sounds like you succeeded at making the cake. What I meant with sweet potato is that 200 g raw potato (which in my case was one small one) gives you 1/2 cup of cooked potato mash - which is how much is needed for the cake and for the frosting. If you have any left over you can just eat it as mashed potato or add to thicken a soup or make fritters - there are so many options. Hope that helps and that you enjoyed the cake. Cheers! Ania
No, not at all, provided you like that combo. It will turn out well, I am sure. I hope you'll enjoy it. x Ania
This time I added some chopped up apples and it was even moister. It always is a hit. I love your recipes and have tried quite a lot already. I also love that
beet root hummus. It is out of this world.
Thank you for the effort you put into this so we can have delicious food.
Blessings
I had some leftover sweet potato, so I baked this cake yesterday for my partner who needed a sweet treat. It was delicious! The hazelnut butter made it smell and taste incredibly.
Thanks for so many great recipes!
Paula
It definitely would need reduction in almond milk, but how much exactly I cannot say for certain. My guess is 0.25 cup less, but that's just a guess. Ania
Thanks for your response! I used caster sugar for this recipe so I'm guessing it's my oven - I've noticed it doesn't bake very evenly and just isn't very reliable in general so probably nothing to do with your recipe. I was still very happy with the result and will try again :)
This looks amazing and I want to give this a try ASAP . Is there ang alternatives to the almond or hazelnut butter as I have a slight nut allergy ?
Thank you!
How about tahini or another seed butter? You could also try oil (mild olive oil, melted coconut oil), but I have not tried and I worry that the amount may need tweaking a little. Hope that helps? Ania
I made this cake today and think the sweet potato is a beautiful idea and works perfectly for the texture of the cake as well as for the icing. I stuck to the original recipe but had to bake it quite a bit longer (90 minutes) until it was baked through. The crumb is really nice and moist but the cake has somewhat of a tough, chewy crust. I noticed that many vegan cakes I've made recently turned out this way and I'm wondering if this has to do with my oven or if that's just a characteristic of a vegan cake...? I'd appreciate your advice / opinion! Otherwise, great flavour and texture - I will make it again!
I'm so happy that you enjoyed the cake. As for the crust, I suspect it's to do with the type of sugar used - what did you use? Caster sugar (white sugar in general) gives the nicest crust, alternative sugars like coconut sugar a bit less so. Hope that helps! Ania
Yes, that's the issue - you have effectively made this cake without any fat (nut butter provided fat) and the liquid to solid ingredient ratio was out because using maple syrup always requires a reduction in liquid volume. Glad to hear that you still liked the taste though!! Ania
I'm glad you like my recipes, but sorry to hear that this cake did not cook through. No extra acid is needed in this recipe as cacao is acidic and so baking soda gets activated from it. I'm not sure I understand the changes you made? Did you skip nut butter completely or did you sub it with another fat? Using maple syrup instead of sugar usually requires liquid reduction in a recipe so this is certainly part of the reason why your cake turned out too wet. Hope that helps! Ania
I am so pleased it worked well for you. Interesting tip about adding glycerine - need to try it myself at some point. Thank you for taking the time to leave such a comment! x Ania
I'm sorry to hear that. I have no idea why that is - maybe it needs even more time? Ovens do tend to vary. Ania