Ok… first of all, stop looking at me like that.
Yea, I can see that crazy look on your face. But it’s me. The same person that brought you amazing Cream Cheese Cinnamon Rolls and Perfect Lemon Pound Cake. We trust each other. We have an understanding. Just go with me on this.
Something about hot summer weather gets me to thinking (or melts my brain) and brings some strange recipes to the surface. Remember last year’s Blueberry Ice Cream with Homemade Hot Fudge? Yea… I got a few strange looks for that too.
Because I still see those raised eyebrows on your face, let me tell you a little about this beast of a cake. Believe me, I was super skeptical too.
The vegan chocolate cake is dense and moist, and everything you might want from a chocolate cake minus the eggs and butter. The fat in the cake is almond oil (or anything you have on hand) and one whole mashed avocado. It’s lovely, and I didn’t taste a lick of avocado in the cake.
The avocado buttercream is a dash more strange. Yes, it’s bright green. Yes, the only fat in the buttercream is avocado meat. It’s sweet with slight hints of citrus. I had my doubts, but when combined with the chocolate cake… holy wow! It actually worked! It was honest-to-goodness delicious! Not to mention vegan and full of healthy fats!
Your thoughts? Have I scared you off?
Vegan Chocolate Cake with Avocado
makes 2 8-inch rounds or 2 thinner 9-inch rounds
from Vegetarian in the Middle East
3 cups all-purpose flour
6 Tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 cups granulated sugar
1/4 cup vegetable oil (I used almond oil)
1/2 cup soft avocado, well mashed, about 1 medium avocado
2 cups water
2 Tablespoons white vinegar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and flour two 8 or 9-inch rounds. Set aside.
Sift together all of the dry ingredients except the sugar. Set that aside too.
Mix all the wet ingredients together in a bowl, including the super mashed avocado.
Add sugar into the wet mix and stir.
Mix the wet with the dry all at once, and beat with a whisk (by hand) until smooth.
Pour batter into a greased cake tins. Bake for 30 to 40 minutes, until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.
Let cakes cool in pan for 15 minutes, then turn out onto cooling racks to cool completely before frosting with avocado buttercream.
Avocado Buttercream Frosting
from Alton Brown
8 ounces of avocado meat, about 2 small to medium, very ripe avocados
2 teaspoons lemon juice
1 pound powdered sugar, sifted
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
Peel and pit the soft avocados. It’s important to use the ripest avocados you can get your hands on. If the avocados have brown spots in the meat, avoid those spots when you scoop the meat into the bowl.
Place the avocado meat into the bowl of a stand mixer fit with the whisk attachment. Add lemon juice and whisk the avocado on medium speed, until slightly lightened in color and smooth, about 2-3 minutes.
Add the powdered sugar a little at a time and beat. Add vanilla extract until combined. If not using right away, store in the refrigerator. Don’t worry. It won’t turn brown!
{ 294 comments… read them below or add one }
← Previous Comments
Fabulous cake! A friend recommended this to me, and I made it for my son’s third birthday. I loved that it wasn’t too sweet. I made a cream cheese frosting instead of the one that you recommended, and it was great, too. Pics on my blog. Thanks for sharing!
The cake is flawless. By far the best vegan chocolate cake I’ve ever made OR tasted. A word to the wise – weigh the avocado meat for the frosting. Too much avocado and people will definitely make a weird face when they try it. Too little and the sweetness will be overpowering. I think the only way to get it just right is to make sure that there is exactly eight ounces. Other than that, this is delicious and a big hit among my non-vegan friends!
LOVE that you used an Alton Brown recipe. <3 him so much. I made avocado ice cream before and it was delicious, can't wait to try this one.
I didn’t think this recipe could be improved upon – until I saw DARK CHOCOLATE COCOA powder at the store. I swapped it in, and tada! Perfection^2.
Just made it for my very traditional cake-faring family and they love it! The cake tastes like a delicate, moist chocolate cake, but the icing is where the magic happens. The icing tastes smooth and squishy, with such an unimitable taste. The avocado makes the whole thing awesome.
Plus, the icing changes color (mine is pistachio after three days), but hasn’t browned!
Awesome recipe
I JUST made this and… it’s LOVELY. My avocados weren’t ripe enough for the icing though, so I’ve skipped out on that. I’m thinking of maybe making a custard or a chocolate sauce to go with it. I know, I know, it’s disregarding the whole vegan thing! I can’t help it. Maybe even a toffee sauce? Hmm.
The cake is moist, dense and bouncy. Verrrrrrry lovely. I can’t wait to tuck into it later on, after dinner :)
This is awesome. The cake, it looks very delicious.. Very like to eat.
I’ve just made this cake. Not tried the cake part yet, but I was very skeptical about the icing….. but OMG is it amazing! It’s gorgeous! I cannot wait to try the cake as a whole. Thank you for the recipe :D
Ahhhh so yummy. I just made this- thanks for the lovely recipe and photos :)
i try to baked avocado pero malambot (malabsak)..can you pls help me to perfect this recipe . .ano kaya yung mali
I made this over the weekend and took it to work, it was WONDERFUL! Extremely tasty and moist! This might be the ONLY CAKE I ever make from now on. I’ve had more than a dozen co-workers ask for the recipe/website. I however couldn’t use the icing as my avocados weren’t ripe enough yet (thy were just ripe enough for the cake) but, have been told that I have to make it with the icing next time for them to try. :) Thanks for sharing something so YUMMY!
Has anyone tried making these into cupcakes?
Make cupcakes / muffins today. Baked them at 15-20 minutes. No problems with sticking. Super moist. Voila!
Joy, You sold me on the whole avocado thing but since I am gluten free as well you lost me at 3 cups of all purpose flour. Do you have a recommendation for a substitute flour? I really would love to try this cake!
im not a very good gluten free baker. i’d have to seriously play around with this recipe before i could answer you.
Yes-Rice flour, oat flour, or Soy Flour. You can also use oatmeal and grind it fine in the blender . Bob’s Red Mill sells a variety of flours, including gluten free. They are all natural and usually organic.
Claire, to make this recipe gluten free I’d suggest substituting the AP flour with equal parts (3/4 cup each) brown rice flour, sweet rice flour, millet flour and sorghum flour.
Claire, I had already seen this on another website and coverted it for GF. New recipe below.
2 ½ cups GF SR flour
6 Tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder (substitute 100g grated dark chocolate)
½ teaspoon salt
1½ tblsp carb soda
1 tblsp xantham gum
2 cups raw sugar
¾ cup chopped walnuts (optional or you could add them on top of the icing)
¼ cup avocado or other nut oil
½ cup soft avocado, well mashed, about 1 medium avocado
2 cups water
2 tblsps lemon juice
2 teasps vanilla extract
Method
1. Preheat oven to 350°F/180°C. Grease & flour or line with baking paper 2 x 8” round cake tins. Put to the side ready.
2. Sift together all of the dry ingredients except the sugar. Set sugar aside.
3. Mix all the wet ingredients together in a bowl, including the super mashed avocado.
4. Add sugar into the wet mix and stir.
5. Mix the wet with the dry all at once, and beat with a whisk (by hand) until smooth.
6. Pour batter into prepared cake tin(s). Bake for 30 to 40 minutes, until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.
7. Let cakes cool in pan for 15 minutes, then turn out onto cooling racks to cool completely before frosting with avocado buttercream.
I love love love this recipe.
I made this cake with gluten-free flours just the other day. I hope it’s okay that I shared my gluten-free version of the recipe on my site. The flour combinations I used were:
1 cup brown rice flour
3/4 cup sorghum flour
1/4 cup teff flour
1/2 cup tapioca starch
1/2 cup cornstarch
1 1/2 teaspoons xanthan gum
I kind of just chose the flours on a whim and was quite happy with the results – and don’t forget the xanthan gum too. It wasn’t grainy or anything. My only mistake was flouring the pans with brown rice flour – a dumb idea on my part. Left a grainy film on the outside of both cakes. I won’t make that mistake twice.
i just bake a cake from the avocdo recipe i love it keep up the good work
This looks really good/interesting. One question, does the icing really take a pound of powdered sugar? That seems like an awful lot. Anyone tried cutting it back a bit?
Thanks.
Tried Chocolate Cake From this, Believe me it was awesome! http://bit.ly/pyUDYf
I made this Joy, I made it! And it kind of blew my mind. I love how creative you are. Thanks for being awesome.
Hi Joy! I’m looking forward to making this cake for a dairy-free colleague. I have avocado oil – I’m wondering if you think that would work alright for the cake? I don’t want it to be too overpowering. Thanks!
I think avocado oil would be overpowering.
Oh, Joy, I love you…but this one, this cake right here…had me raising my eyebrows a bit and wondering just how crazy your crazybrain really is. I could not resist, though. I love avocados. The cake – out of this world! My goodness, I could not believe how delicious this was. However, the frosting was a point of contention in my household. My husband had unpleasant things to say about it (he does tend to overreact to non-traditional baking), and I wasn’t all that crazy about it myself. We scraped it off. Sorry. I would definitely make this cake again, but frost it with something else. Maybe a cashew cream frosting, to keep it vegan? (even though I’m not)
Thank you, Joy, for making brilliant and strange things happen in my kitchen.
this is amazing. i just made cupcakes from this recipe. it made about 24 and i baked them for 18 minutes. i didn’t use the icing – i’m not a big fan of lots of icing – instead, i just put a few vegan chocolate chips on top of each of them right out of the oven – and they sorta melted into the cupcake :)
i also decreased the sugar to 1 & 1/2 cups instead of 2 and it’s still a delicious cake. i used apple cider vinegar instead of white – i’ve also used balsamic in another vegan choc. cake recipe before and it’s been fine.
wonderful recipe. thanks so much. can’t wait till my husband gets home to try these!
You are so weird. Having said that, I make killer avocado muffins with slivers of toasted almonds. I’m trying to work up the courage to include this frosting in my avocado repertoire. Or I could just, you know, make guacamole.
← Previous Comments
{ 84 trackbacks }