chocolate cake

I tried out a new recipe for chocolate cake yesterday. Now, there are plenty of great chocolate cakes out there. There even a good vegan chocolate cake--good enough that folks don't really know it's vegan. But there's always room for a new cake, right? And my favorite vegan chocolate cake doesn't actually turn out of a pan and make a nice presentation--which, face it, is part of cake baking.

So last night I tried a new (to me) vegan chocolate cake, and it was a big hit. It requires no weird ingredients, it turns out of a pan for a nice presentation (though you'll have to trust me on that, as I didn't take pictures), and my dinner guests didn't guess it was vegan. So there. (Oh, it's low fat, too, in case you care...) I got it from Veganomicon, though I borrowed the chocolate drizzle from a different Veganomicon recipe (for a peanut butter chocolate caramel pie that I'm going to have to try next). Here it is:

Vegan Chocolate Bundt Cake

for the cake:
1-3/4 cups fresh-brewed coffee (I used decaf)
2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (the darker the better)
1-1/2 cups granulated sugar
1/3 cup canola oil
1/3 cup unsweetened applesauce
1/4 cup cornstarch
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 tsp. almond extract
2 cups flour (they use whole wheat pastry flour; I only had unbleached all-purpose, which was fine)
1 tsp. baking soda
1-1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt

for the drizzle:
1/4 to 1/3 cups each vegan (or not) chocolate chips and soy milk

Preheat oven to 325F; spray or otherwise grease an 8-10 inch bundt pan

Heat the coffee in a saucepan. Once it is simmering, whisk in the cocoa and continue to whisk over the heat until the cocoa is dissolved. Put aside to cool.

Whisk together in a mixing bowl the sugar, applesauce, oil, and cornstarch until the cornstarch is dissolved. Whisk in the extracts. Once the coffee mixture has cooled whisk that in.

Sift the flour, baking soda and powder, and salt into the wet ingredients, and mix together thoroughly (I whisked it for another couple of minutes). Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 45 - 55 minutes (longer for the smaller pan). The cake is done when a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

Cool in the pan for twenty minutes, then turn out onto a plate. While the cake cools, make the drizzle:

Heat the soymilk to boiling in a small pan, then stir in the chocolate chips until they are thoroughly melted and mixed into the milk. Allow to cool to room temperature, then drizzle over the cooling cake. (It's a little thick for actual drizzling, but it will taste good anyway.)

You can also skip the drizzle and sift a little confectioner's sugar over the top instead, but I have a couple of anti-confectioner's-sugar activists to feed, so I made the drizzle instead.