Vegan Matcha and Dark Chocolate Pound Cake
20
minutes40
minutes1
hourMatcha can be a little overbearing sometimes, and the rich bitter flavor isn’t everybody’s cup of tea. Keeping World Chocolate Day in mind, I wanted to create something unique that would go with dark chocolate, my favorite version of chocolate. Matcha and dark chocolate are both bitter, which is perfectly balanced in this recipe to bring out the mild flavor of green tea against the bitter-sweet backdrop of dark chocolate. The final drizzle of matcha and lemon glaze on top adds a fresh zing to the flavor palette that teases the idea of lemon green tea without being too overbearing.
I struggle sometimes with vegan cakes, since it can get challenging to achieve a moist texture which isn’t too crumbly sans the milk and eggs. However, my experimental attempt left me pleasantly surprised. Vegan buttermilk, a combination of non-dairy milk and vinegar does the trick! I used commercial egg replacer in my recipe, but you could substitute it for alternatives like flax seed egg (a tablespoon of ground flax seed mixed with 2 tablespoons of warm water) or tapioca starch.
Ingredients
1½ cups whole wheat flour
2½ tablespoons matcha
2 teaspoons baking powder
¼ teaspoon salt
¾ cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon egg replacer
1 cup oat milk or non-dairy milk alternative
1 teaspoon vinegar
⅓ cup oil
50g vegan dark chocolate, finely chopped
- For the Matcha Lemon glaze drizzle
¼ cup icing or powdered sugar
1 teaspoon matcha
2 teaspoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
1½ tablespoons water
Directions
- Prep the egg replacer and vegan buttermilk. Mix the egg replacer with 2 tablespoons of warm water and set aside. Stir the vinegar into the oat milk and set aside for at least 15 minutes.
- Dry ingredients. Sift the flour into a medium-sized bowl. Add in the remainder of the dry ingredients: matcha, baking powder and salt.
- Wet ingredients. Whisk in the vegan buttermilk, oil, egg replacer, and brown sugar. Fold in the dark chocolate.
- Get it bakin. Grease the baking tin with a teaspoon of coconut oil and coat with flour, dusting off the excess. Transfer the batter into the tin and bake for around 40 minutes till it passes the toothpick test (consider the cake baked when you prick the cake with a toothpick all the way in, and it comes out clean).
- Drizzle the glaze. Mix together the icing sugar, matcha, lemon juice and water till you achieve a smooth, but thick consistency. Once the cake has cooled to room temperature, use a spoon to drizzle the glaze over the top of the loaf in a zigzag motion.
Notes
- Matcha tends to lose the strength of its flavor over high heat, which is why the cake yields a mild matcha flavor. You can notch up the matcha in the recipe depending on how strong you want the flavor to be.
- I used the Lindt 70% dark chocolate, which worked well with this recipe. You could use an alternative dark chocolate brand, or even switch up for white chocolate, which would work well with the matcha.
- I mostly use brown sugar in my recipes, which is why the cake turned out brown. Switching to white sugar, or adding in a few drops of green food coloring could give you a matcha green cake.
