vegan lemon cake

Another test cake for Braxton’s birthday, I made this lemon cake a few times. The first time I tried using polenta – not sure why as cakes with polenta are always too doughy for my liking. Not really sure who makes cakes with polenta that aren’t like that?? Anyway the second time I omitted it and just used more ground almonds instead and it turned out much lighter.

It’s hard to make a lemon drizzle cake per-se, without sugar or eggs, because you don’t get that exact same light colour, so I’m calling this lemon cake instead of lemon drizzle cake.

I used flax ‘eggs’ in place of the eggs and it did rise beautifully. I’m sure it’s all to do with timing and sometimes it just works out better than other times with baking, at least for me anyway.

I’m going to be serving this, alongside a Victoria Sponge I’m working on, some cookies, and an awesome cake my friend Mrs Hollingsworth is making for us – that will be the piece de resistance!

I hope they all turn out okay on the day. It’s a lot of pressure making all the food and cakes for a birthday party, especially when not everyone is used to the ‘free from’ lifestyle, but hopefully they’ll all be so delicious no one will even know the difference!

Ingredients

2 flax eggs (2 tbsp ground flax mixed with 5 tbsp warm water)
1 cup ground almonds
1/2 cup buckwheat flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
Pinch Himalayan salt
Juice of 4 lemons
Zest of 2 lemons
1/2 cup maple syrup
1/4 cup almond or oat milk
2 tbsp coconut oil, melted

For the drizzle:
Juice of 1 lemon
1 tbsp Natvia icing sugar substitute or coconut palm sugar

Method

Preheat the oven to 180*.

Prepare the flax eggs by mixing the flax with water in a small box and setting aside.

In a large bowl, mix together the ground almonds, buckwheat, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

Pour in the lemon juice, lemon zest, milk, coconut oil, maple syrup and flax eggs. Mix well to combine.

Transfer to a prepared loaf tin and bake for around 30 minutes or until a fork comes out clean. Leave to cool completely before removing.

Mix the lemon juice and icing sugar in a bowl and once the cake is cool, remove from the tin and pour over the juice and garnish with lemon zest.

Love & health,
Lauren

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