....is Apple Walnut Crumb Cake

Adapted from My Father's Daughter Spiced Apple Crumb Muffins

A friend of mine is vegan and it's incredibly hard for her to find baked goods that don't contain some form of butter, milk or eggs. I made it a goal to try and find recipes that were both delicious and vegan. (My first attempt at this was Vegan Chocolate Chip Banana Bread followed by Phanouropita Cake and both were great!) I made this Crumb Cake for the first time this weekend, it was wonderful hot (I could hardly wait for it to cool!), I liked it the next morning cold and it was amazing reheated with ice cream for dessert. What is a good name of Breakfast for Dessert? Breakssert? Dessfast? ....it's a work in progress.

....is Phanouropita Cake with a Story

I've been reading this book, Best Food Writing 2011 - Edited by Holly Hughes there are a lot of great articles in here, probably how they made it into the book. I came upon my first recipe in the book about quarter of the way through in a story Saints, Cakes & Redemption by Allison Parker and decided to give it a try.

1 Cup Vegetable Oil (plus more for greasing)
1 Cup Freshly Squeezed Orange Juice (from about 3 Oranges)
1/2 Cup Brandy
1 Cup Sugar
1 Cup Walnuts, Finely Chopped
4 Cup Flour
1-1/2 tsp Baking Soda
1-1/2 tsp Baking Powder
1-1/2 tsp Cinnamon
1/4 tsp Cloves

Preheat the oven to 375°F (190°C) degrees. Oil the bottom and sides of a 9x13 pan.

In a large bowl, whisk together the Oil, Orange Juice, Brandy, and Sugar until thoroughly combined. Mix in the Walnuts.

Sift together into a medium bowl the remaining dry ingredients. In small batches, add the Flour Mixture to the Brandy Mixture, whisking vigorously as you go. Continue whisking until completely combined. Tradition dictates that you’re supposed to whisk for 9 minutes by hand. (I recommend you start the time when the first batch a Flour Mixture is added, but that may be cheating)

Scrape the Batter into the prepared pan. Before putting the cake into the oven, pause to say whatever kind of prayer you feel comfortable with as you focus on the thing you hope to find.

Bake the cake until the top looks hard and golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 19 minutes. Let cool in the pan for 5 minutes, then remove the cake from the pan and let it cool completely on a wire rack.

Traditionally, the cake is now given away whole or cut into nine pieces and shared with others. If you’re serving the cake at home, you may want to sift a little powdered sugar over the top of the cake before slicing. The cake dries out easily, so if you do cut into it, make sure to wrap any leftovers well in plastic and foil, or store in an airtight container.

Here's my work space, complete the the book on the edge of the counter and Hulu playing while I bake. This was a delicious cake, definitely better hot and fresh. I think next time I'll serve it with Ice Cream. On  an other note, this is another sweet treat my Vegan friend can eat.

....is Vegan Chocolate Chip Banana Bread

A friend of mine is vegan and she said rarely does she find desserts she can eat. Almost everything has butter, cream or eggs. So I set out on a mission to make something deliciously Vegan. I started with Banana Bread. I only needed to find substitution for 3 things since it doesn't have Eggs, it only has 3 tsp of Buttermilk, 1/2 Cup of Butter and 1 Cup Chocolate Chips. The last one worried me the most, I though Vegan Chocolate meant Icky Chocolate. There's a lot of Dark Chocolate that's 'almost Vegan' when I checked out the wrapper it would say '.01% Milk' or 'May Contain Milk'. I want to know how they don't know whether or not it contains Milk? Anyway, I finally found 'Enjoy Life - Mini Chips - Dairy, Nut & Soy Free' and they were actually good.

1 Cup Sugar
1/2 Cup Vegetable Oil Spread*
3 Ripe Bananas
1/2 tsp Vanilla
3 tsp Silk Creamer*
2 Cup Flour
1 tsp Baking Powder
1 tsp Baking Soda
1/2 tsp Cinnamon*
1 C Enjoy Life - Mini Chips*

Cream Sugar, Butter, Bananas, Vanilla and Creamer. Add Flour and Baking Powder. Dissolve Baking Soda in small amount of Water, add to other mixture. Add Chocolate Chips. Bake in a 9x13 at 350 for 30 min.

So good it was gone before I could get a picture....

*Ingredients in Bold are what differ from the original recipe.