Chocolate Cake with Avocado Peanut Butter Frosting

Things have happened.  I have thought about my blog come back on and off for the past year.  Where have I been?  Nowhere in particular that forced me to stop blogging.  I just fell of the wagon and never got back on.  Now a lot has happened and I don't know where to start.

I was impregnated.  Grew a baby.  Now, we have little Birk Oliver!

He can't eat food yet, but it sure will be fun when he can.  I am quite enjoying him being the adorable baby that he is, so I am in no rush.  

So, that was one big thing that happened.  The other...Scot and I have crossed over to the vegetarian world.  We have always been so close.  But now we are closer.  We basically don't eat meat anymore.  For all practical purposes, we are vegetarians.  For the unpractical purposes, I talk Scot into eating bacon with me zero, once, or twice a month.

The thing is...Scot is a much better vegetarian than me.  He would probably never eat meat again if it weren't for me.  Something I would have never predicted when I met 21 year old Scot.  Little Birk will now grow up vegetarian.

What is worse, we feel guilty eating any animal protein (kidding about the worse thing).  Not that it stops us.  We have done little things like replacing our milk with almond milk.  Thinking more about whether dairy is necessary for different dishes.  We have experimented with vegan favorites like chia seeds instead of eggs, coconut oil, non-dairy milks, etc.

What I am trying to say is...please don't be scared away!  I am still a true foodie.  Cooking vegetarian is easy.  Cooking vegan is actually fascinating.  I am still mostly human.

This year for Scot's birthday, he tasked me with the impossible.  Make him a cake that is healthy so that when he eats a piece everyday for the week following...he doesn't feel AS guilty.  What does healthy mean?  Vegan.  And no white sugar or flour.  So gross, basically.

I told him I couldn't do the refined flour/sugar thing.  It is your birthday not national diabetes awareness day.  But I almost achieved the goal.

I ended up making a chocolate cake.  It is sweetened with maple syrup.  The fat comes from an avocado.  Flour is of the whole wheat variety.  It was a solid chocolate cake.  I underbaked it on purpose and it was anything but dry.

For frosting, I made an avocado frosting.  This has been on my radar for about 5 years.  Replace the butter in frosting with an avocado.  I was most excited to have a beautiful green frosting.  This limited the additional flavor additions.  I ended up going with peanut butter and avocado frosting since it would leave the green.  I would imagine a chocolate avocado frosting would be delicious too, but not green.  Since I used freshly ground peanuts, my frosting was not as smooth as the original.

The frosting recipe is a recommendation at best.  And it has the one nasty, illegal ingredient:  powdered sugar!  Hopefully we survive.

In true foodforscot fashion, I made this late at night.  So enjoy the horrible photos!  But seriously, Scot did very much enjoy his birthday cake.  He ate the entire thing, except the one piece I had on his birthday.  It is really everything Scot is about in cake form.

PS:  Scot is the father.

Chocolate Cake with Avocado Peanut Butter Frosting

adapted from The Diva Dish

For cake:

1.5 cups whole wheat pastry flour

1/3 cup cocoa powder

1 tsp. baking soda

½ tsp. salt

1 avocado, mashed

1 cup almond milk

¾ cup maple syrup

2 tsp. vanilla

1 tsp. apple cider vinegar

handful of chocolate chips (optional)

For Frosting:

1 avocado, mashed

1-2 cups powdered sugar

1-2 tbsp almond milk

½ cup peanut butter (I used freshly ground)

For Cake: Mix dry ingredients in a bowl and set aside. In a separate bowl, mix wet ingredients until combined. Make sure avocado isn’t lumpy (it will probably be a little lumpy, just saying).

Add wet to dry and mix until incorporated.

Pour into a greased 8-inch cake pan and bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for about 20 minutes (check every few minutes after 20 until done).

Once cake is done, remove from oven and let cool completely.

For Frosting: Blend all the ingredients in a food processor until creamy.

Spread frosting on cake and sprinkle with some chocolate jimmies!

(Servings: 6-8, Prep time: 30 min., Bake time: 30 min., Frost time: 20 min., Difficulty: Easy)

Printable Version

foodforscot Ratings:

Shanon (taste): 6/10
Scot (taste): 8/10
Effort: 1/5
Dishwashing Effort: 2/5