Recipe by Adeline Mason

Photo by Adeline Mason

Ingredients

  • 2 lemons, zested
  • 2 cups diced strawberries (about 1/2 in cubes) 
  • 1 cup of vegan butter, room temp (I used earth balance)
  • 4 tbsps Bob’s Red Mill Egg Replacer (4 “eggs” needed for this recipe. Follow package’s instructions)
  • 3 cups all purpose flour
  • 2 cups sugar
  • 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 1 tsp salt3/4 cup plant-based milk of choice (I used soy)1 tsp vanilla extract

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease your baking tins, and line bottom with parchment paper.

Beat together vegan butter and sugar, add egg replacers and lemon zest.

In a separate mixing bowl, mix flower baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

Add the dry ingredients, lemon juice, soy milk, and vanilla to the original mixture and mix until incorporated. (Note: Do not over mix your batter, or your cake won’t be soft and delicate.)

Gently fold in diced strawberries with spatula. 

Divide cake batter between two cake pans, and bake for 35-45 min or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean. 

“Buttercream” Frosting Ingredients

  • Juice from half a lemon (use more or less as needed)
  • 1 cup vegan butter, room temp (earth balance)
  • 3 to 4 cups powdered sugar (depending on how thick you like the frosting, original recipe called for 3 cups, but I found that the frosting wasn’t substantial enough)
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla extract 
  • 1/2 tsp lemon extract

Instructions

Mix together all wet ingredients with half of your powdered sugar and mix well, slowly add the rest of the powdered sugar and continue to mix until desired consistency.  

Time to Assemble

When I assembled the cake, I basted the top of the cakes with a little lemon-vanilla simple syrup before frosting, so the cake stayed nice and moist. To make, you’ll need need 1/2 cup sugar, 1/3 cup water, juice from half a lemon, and a splash of vanilla extract. Add all ingredients to a saucepan over medium heat and stir until sugar is fully dissolved. I used a basting brush and brushed the tops of the cake with the simple syrup. (I had quite a bit of the simple syrup leftover, so I saved it and made a pretty killer old fashioned with some of it.) Then, I layered the cakes with the buttercream and slices of fresh strawberries. 

Notes From the Baker: This recipe will yield two 9-inch cake pans; however, I multiplied this recipe by 1.5 and made an extra cake pan because I wanted an extra layer for a really tall cake.