Chocolate has been my go-to comfort food for as long as I can remember. I love chocolate, especially chocolate flavored treats. When I was little, I remember during Christmas or any birthday party events, I'd skip meals just so I could dive straight to the dessert table and gorge myself with anything chocolate related! My favorite were mud cakes. My moms friend knew I had a weakness for them, and she would bake the most decadent, chocolate-y, moist mud cake to bring to birthday parties or get-togethers.
Mud cakes aren't very good for you as they contain lots of butter, sugar, and cream. It usually leaves you feeling heavy, sick and uncomfortable, though I did not mind that feeling once upon a time. A week ago, I craved that chocolate-y goodness and found a lightened up vegan recipe that turned out super wonderful and reminded me of the mud cakes my moms friend made!!
Ingredients:
1 cup coconut oil
400g dark vegan chocolate (or normal dark chocolate if you aren't concerned with it being vegan)
3/4 cuppa coconut sugar (or whatever sugar you have on hand)
1 cup of water
1/4 cup of orange juice
3/4 cup of flour
3/4 cup of self-raising flour
1 cup of cacao powder
3 egg replacers (I used 4 tablespoons of chia seeds mixed with ground flaxseeds)
1/2 cuppa almond cream, or coconut cream, or regular cream. (Whatever cream you can get your hands on!)
What to do?
Preheat your oven to 180 degrees celcius.
Melt 200 grams of chocolate, add in your sugar, juice and coconut oil. Leave it for a bit to cool.
Combine your flours, cacao powder and egg replacers.
Pour in your chocolate-y mix and fold it in.
Pour into an 8-inch pan and bake until toothpick comes out clean! (I forgot to check how long I baked mine for but I think it was approximately 20 minutes, sorry!!)
Take the cake out and let it cool while you make the ganache.
Melt the rest of the chocolate with the cream and pour it over your cake. Decorate with whatever pretty tidbits you have around! I used almonds, cacao nibs, macadamias and bee pollen.
Enjoy!! xoxo
