Specials Board: Raspberry Cake

EDIT POST: Great news! I've been chosen as a finalist for the "Great Vegan Bake Off" with my delicious Raspberry Cake. Please take a moment and vote for me! Thank you!

PETA are holding the competition and if you click on the pink finalist badge below it will take you to the voting page.

Now, I've shared my good news with you - on with the post!

After a visit to my gardening angels allotment the other day I came back armed with a big punnet of raspberries, lovely! Raspberries don't keep all that well especially piled up on top of one another, as the bottom ones get squished. So, I had to come up with a recipe(s) that used them before that happened. I didn't want to go down the jam, compote or smoothie route I wanted something I could enjoy over a couple or more days. So I set to in my kitchen and made a cake! 

Now, as you know from a previous post I am not the most confident in the baking department but after my chocolate pudding success I thought to myself go on "you can do it!" As I only had one punnet of raspberries I only had the one chance. I didn't want to ruin the beautiful harvest my friend had given to me and there was no way I was going to let this happen.

So armed with determination, bravery and dedication I set to in the kitchen. After wandering around looking in my cupboards talking to myself for what seemed an age I came up with this.

By the way, did you know that today is "Raspberry Cake Day" so why not celebrate by picking up some raspberries and treating yourself to this deliciously moist raspberry cake. Enjoy!

Ingredients
365g Fresh raspberries*
1 Tbsp Maple syrup
250g Plain flour
1 Tsp Baking powder
1 Tsp Bicarbonate of Soda
140g Light brown sugar
100ml Light olive oil
250ml Plain soy yoghurt
1 Tsp Vanilla paste
150g Silken tofu
100g Vegan white chocolate

*You don't need all of these raspberries for this recipe but I made them into a puree which I then used to make my raspberry and coconut mousse. Recipe coming soon.....

Method
Set your oven to a moderate temperature, I can't give you an actual temperature as the numbers on my oven dial have disappeared from too much cleaning! But the position was between 7 and 8 o'clock!

Grease two Victorian sandwich tins with a little vitalite on kitchen paper, then sprinkle a little flour over and tap the tin around until the vitalite is coated with the flour. This will prevent sticking.

Sift the flour, baking powder and bicarbonate of soda into a large bowl. Add the sugar, I sifted this too so as to remove the big lumps. Remember this was my one and only chance to get this recipe right! You don't need to sift the sugar. Mix the ingredients with a spoon.

Now make your raspberry puree. Place the raspberries and maple syrup into your blender and blend to a puree. I used my beloved vitamix which pureed in seconds, yep I'm still loving it! Pass the puree through a sieve. 

This will make 350ml of raspberry puree, of which you will only need around 200ml for this recipe. Save the remaining 150ml of raspberry purree and make my raspberry and coconut mousse which I will post tomorrow.

In a separate bowl whisk together the olive oil, vanilla paste and soy yoghurt until combined and slowly add 100ml of the raspberry puree, mix until everything is amalgamated.

Now add the wet ingredients to the dry and stir in, you will need to work fast here as the mixture will start to go grey! This is because of a chemical reaction between the baking soda and the raspberry puree, but don't worry its fine.

Pour the mixture into the two tins and spread the mixture evenly with a little dimple in the middle and bake in a moderate oven for 20 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.

Leave to cool  for a little while in the tins before transferring to a rack to cool completely.

To make the raspberry frosting, place the tofu and 3 Tbsp of the raspberry puree into your food processor and blend, scraping down the sides as you go, until the two ingredients are fully blended.

Melt the vegan white chocolate in a bain marie or microwave whichever is your preferred method and pour into the tofu and raspberry mixture. Blend again, scraping down the sides so that everything is mixed together. You know have a gorgeous white chocolate and raspberry frosting, don't try it as you won't have enough for your cake as you'll keep going back for another dip!

Spread a quarter to a third of the raspberry frosting on one of the raspberry sponges and top with the other sponge. Pipe the remaining frosting on top of the sponge and decorate with dark chocolate pips.

Enjoy!

Since scouring the internet for other food challenges I came across Alphabakes, which is a challenge that asks for recipes or the main ingredient to the recipe beginning with a different letter each month. "Anything goes as long as the random letter is predominately featured in the recipe as one of the main ingredients or flavours or in the name of the bake itself". July's challenge is recipes beginning with "R", so the recipe above is a perfect fit! Alphabakes is being hosted by Ros from the more than the occasional baker blog and if you want to see the entries for last month and the letter "D" check out Carolines blog - Caroline Makes.

There is a special prize for a recipe entered in July, which will be randomly chosen, so wish me luck!