Vegan Lemon Poppy Seed Pound Cake

This post is sponsored by Alpro

You read the title of the post right, this is a vegan recipe. For the last few years the demand for vegan recipes has skyrocketed and I have never really felt confident in developing recipes without eggs and dairy, it wasn’t what I knew. Over the last year I have quietly been playing around with vegan baking, trying to teach myself how to use vegan alternatives and create recipes that work and are delicious. To kick off a new occasional series of vegan baking I have also just been named as an ambassador for Alpro and todays recipe is the first recipe developed for our new partnership.

When it comes to vegan baking the idea a lot of people have (myself included at one point) is that you will need all manner of strange ingredients that you’ll need to find online on some random website. Thankfully so much vegan baking is making simple swaps and for this recipe, a lemon poppy seed pound cake, it couldn’t be easier. The cake is made with oil instead of butter and Alpro Plain No Sugars, a plant based alternative to yoghurt, (available from …) and the eggs, well there are no eggs. 

Eggs are a key building block of so much baking, they add fat, they help bind ingredients together and they also help with the rise of a cake. Without them cakes need lots of adjustments to make them work. This cake is thankfully incredibly simple, using the muffin method where the wet ingredients are added to the dry and everything is mixed together. Because this method adds no air through creaming and there are no eggs to help it along, all the leavening is chemical, in this case baking soda. The acid in this recipe, from the lemon juice, also helps the baking soda react and create a nicely textured cake, moist but with a tight tender crumb, the perfect vegan pound cake.

For a lemon cake I want the lemon flavour unadorned, simple. The olive oil used in the recipe adds a subtle flavour but doesn’t overpower the citrus and the Alpro Plain No Sugars adds a little tang, and helps keep the cake moist but because it is made without sugar it also helps keep the cake from becoming overly sweet. For those who are also trying to reduce their levels of saturated fat, because this cake is made with olive oil and Alpro Plain No Sugars it has lower levels of saturated fat than a cake made with butter and the dairy traditionally used in this sort of cake. 

Lemon Poppy Seed Pound Cake

250g caster sugar
Zest of 3 lemons
4 tbsp poppy seeds
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp fine sea salt
375g plain flour
350ml Alpro Plain No Sugars
150ml olive oil
125ml lemon juice

Lemon Soak
75ml lemon juice
75g caster sugar

Preheat the oven to 180ºC (160ºC Fan) and grease a 10-cup capacity bundt pan.

Add the caster sugar and lemon zest to a large bowl and use your fingers to rub together until the sugar resembles wet sand. Rubbing the zest into the sugar helps to bring out the oils from the zest and makes for a more flavourful cake. Add the poppy seeds, baking soda, salt and flour and whisk together until evenly combined. 

Add the Alpro Plain No Sugars and olive oil and whisk together to combine. Juice the lemons and pour 125ml juice into the oil mixture and whisk to combine. Make a well in the dry goods and pour in the liquid ingredients and mix gently together until a thick, smooth cake batter is formed. Scrape the batter into the prepared bundt tin and spread into an even layer. 

Bake in the preheated oven for about 55-60 minutes or until golden brown and a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean. Whilst the cake is baking make the soak by adding the lemon juice and sugar to a small saucepan and place over medium heat and cook just until the sugar has dissolved. 

Remove the cake from the oven and cool for 10 minutes before turning the cake out onto a wire rack to cool. When the cake is unmoulded, brush over the syrup until all has been used.  

You can make a glaze or a frosting if you want but I love a pound cake served as it is, served on its own with nothing but a big mug of tea to go with it. 

Blueberry and Lemon Poppyseed Bundt Cake

This post is sponsored by Doves Farm Organic Flour

I don’t know about you but during lockdown the thing that has kept me smiling has been spending time in the kitchen, baking up a storm. Whether it’s sourdough, banana bread or any of the hundred things we have all made the last few months, I think we can all agree baking brings us joy. Today’s recipe is another collaboration with Doves Farm and celebrates summer, making something jam packed with berries but also something that can be whipped up minutes. Perfect for summer or to brighten up a grey London day, it’s also a nice tie in with Doves Farm’s new colourful feel-good packaging design which you’ll find in stores now. For those of you who don’t know Doves Farm, they’re a UK organic flour brand and they sell everything from plain flour to ancient grains like rye and buckwheat. Whilst it seems to me that flour shortages are much less frequent at this point if you’re still struggling to find flour and yeast, Doves Farm have also launched an ‘Organic Flour Baking Box’ (£11 plus delivery), available to purchase on their website and delivered direct to your door and contains a great selection of their organic flours - including plain, self raising, bread and specialty flours - plus yeast for making bread, you can find out more here. 

This week’s recipe could not be easier, it can be made as a one bowl or you can add one more little step to make it with two bowls, but regardless of what method you choose it is as easy as pouring some wet stuff into some dry stuff and stirring it all together. Its pure simplicity. For the recipe I went with blueberries and lemon but really this is a very adaptable recipe. Use whatever berry and citrus combination you prefer. Don’t have buttermilk? No worries use yoghurt, or sour cream thinned with a little milk. The recipe is also super bright and colourful, stained with the juice from the berries and topped with a simple blueberry glaze which, depending on the berries you use, will come out a vibrant pink or a beautiful violet. 

This week’s recipe uses Doves Farm Organic Plain flour which is available from Ocado, Sainsburys and Tesco.

Blueberry and Lemon Poppyseed Bundt Cake
Serves 12-14

265g golden caster sugar
zest of 2 lemons
185ml light olive oil
175ml buttermilk
4 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla bean paste
280g Doves Farm Organic Plain Flour
1/2 tsp fine sea salt
1/4 tsp baking soda 
2 tbsp poppy seeds
300g blueberries

Blueberry Glaze
50g blueberries, plus extra for decoration
200g icing sugar
Few drops of lemon juice

To make the cake preheat the oven to 180ºC (160ºC Fan). Lightly grease, and dust with flour, a bundt pan (you can use anything 8-cup capacity or up). 

If making with my preferred method add the sugar and lemon zest to a large bowl and use your fingertips to rub the zest into the sugar until the sugar has a moist texture. This releases the oils in the zest and makes for a more flavourful cake. Add the oil, buttermilk, eggs and vanilla and whisk until combined. In a separate bowl whisk together the Doves Farm Plain Flour, salt and baking soda. Make a well in the dry goods and pour in the buttermilk mixture, whisking the two mixtures together until smooth. Add the poppy seeds and blueberries and stir together to distribute evenly. 

If you want to make this as a one bowl recipe, add the Doves Farm Plain Flour, salt, baking soda and sugar to a large bowl and whisk together until combined. Make a well in the dry goods then add in the oil, buttermilk, eggs and lemon zest and whisk together until smooth. Add in the poppy seeds and blueberries and stir together.

Scrape the cake batter into the prepared bundt pan and then bake for about 55 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the middle of the cake comes out clean. Remove the cake from the oven and allow to cool in the pan for 15 minutes then carefully invert it onto a wire rack to cool completely. 

For the glaze (which is optional, the cake is plenty moist without it) use a hand blender to puree the berries then mix in the icing sugar and a few drops of lemon juice until you have a thick but pourable glaze. Pour the glaze over the cooled cake and top with a few extra blueberries. 

Kept covered this cake will keep for 3-4 days.

Pistachio and Cherry Sheet Cake

Happy Birthday to me! Yes this week recipe is my own birthday cake. Whenever I tell people that I like to make my own birthday cake they always seem sad, like no-one offered to make one for me. The truth is, I quite like making it myself maybe I’m control freak when it comes to cakes? I rarely get to bake just for fun these days, it’s always for a work project, for a magazine feature or to meet a book deadline. This week the baking was just for me, or at least it was until I decided to give you guys the recipe and make a video from it. Oh well, the intention to bake purely for its enjoyment was there. 

My birthday isn’t the only thing I am celebrating this week though, it is now just one month until my new book, One Tin Bakes, is finally published, and to say I am excited is quite the understatement. For those of you who haven’t heard anything about the book it’s a book dedicated to recipes that all use the exact same one tin, specifically a 9x13 tin you would traditionally use for brownies. The recipes run the gamut of cakes, cookies, brownies and bars, desserts, pastry and even a bunch of yeasted recipes. The idea was to reduce the required bakeware to just one single thing so that everyone could make the recipes, with just one tin the barrier to entry is so much lower. Baking for everyone!

This weeks recipe isn’t from the book but you could think of it as a bonus recipe, it’s an example of what you might find in the pages of the book and in spirit, this is a One Tin Bakes recipe. The cake recipe is a simple pistachio sheet cake which, like its almond brothers and sisters, is a moist cake that’s a smidge dense but without ever being heavy, its the perfect sheet cake texture as far as i’m concerned. The topping is a classic cream cheese frosting enriched with plenty of vanilla and finished with a simple cherry compote, a wonderful flavour combination and something which felt like the perfect choice for spending my birthday relaxing in the park enjoying the unseasonably warm weather we had this week. 

If you would like to read more about my new book, I have a page dedicated to it, which provides links to where the book can be pre-ordered wherever you are in the world, whether that is online or if your looking for an independent bookstore to support. The book is released June 25th in the UK and New Zealand, June 30th in Australia and Sept 1st in the US. 

Pistachio Sheet Cake
335g unsalted butter, room temperature
300g caster sugar
Zest of 3 limes
6 large eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract (or bean paste)
100g plain flour
200g pistachios*
100g ground almonds
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp fine sea salt

*pistachios can be more expensive so if you want to make this an almond cake simply replace the pistachios with an equal weight of ground almonds and skip the grinding step. 

Cherry Compote
350g cherries, stoned and halved
50g caster sugar
Juice of 1/2 lime
1/4 tsp almond extract (optional)

Cream Cheese Frosting
75g unsalted butter, room temperature
125g full fat cream cheese, room temperature
400g icing sugar
1/4 tsp fine sea salt
2 tsp vanilla bean paste
2-3 tbsp finely chopped pistachios

Preheat the oven to 180C (160C Fan) and lightly grease a deep 9x13 brownie tin and line the base with parchment paper (this tin from Nordicware is the one I recommend in the book).

Place the pistachios into a food processor and pulse until finely ground, you’re looking for the same consistency as ground almonds. Add the flour and almonds and pulse to combine. Tip the nut mixture into a large bowl and whisk in the baking powder and salt. Place the butter, sugar and lime zest into the bowl of a stand mixer (you can also make this with an electric hand mixer) and, using the paddle attachment, cream together for about 5 minutes, on medium speed, until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating until fully combined before adding the next. Once the eggs are combined add the vanilla and mix to combine. Add the nut mixture and mix on low speed until combined. Scrape the mixture into the prepared tin and spread into an even layer. 

Bake the cake in the preheated oven for about 50-55 minutes or until the cake springs back to a light touch and is pulling away from the sides of the tin. Remove from the oven and set the tin on a wire rack to cool completely. 

Whilst the cake is baking start making the compote. Mix together the cherries, sugar, lime zest and almond extract, if using, and set aside for the moment. The almond extract amplifies the cherry flavour but you can leave it out if you prefer. 

When the cake is baked remove from the oven and set the tin on a wire rack to cool completely. To finish the compote tip the cherry mixture into a small saucepan and cook over medium heat until the mixture comes to a boil. Continue cooking for a couple minutes before using a slotted spoon to transfer the cherries to a bowl, leaving the cooking juices in the pan. I cook the cherries for a couple minutes to soften them but remove them before they break down into mush. Continue cooking the juices until reduced and slightly syrupy. Scrape the syrup over the fruit and then transfer to the fridge to cool completely. 

For the frosting place the cream cheese and butter into the bowl of a stand mixer, fitted with the paddle attachment. Beat on medium/high speed until creamy and lump free. Slowly add in the icing sugar beating until light and fluffy. Add in the vanilla and salt and beat to combine. Spread the frosting over the cooled cake and top with the compote, sprinkling over a couple tablespoons of chopped pistachios. 

Sourdough Chocolate Chip Banana Bread Muffins

During isolation the internet seems to be obsessed with two things, sourdough and banana bread (okay and maybe toilet roll and growing spring onions from scraps in a jar). Obviously I have you covered on Sourdough, whether you’ve never tackled it before or whether you want a new recipe to try, and of course banana bread isn’t anything new around here. Hopefully by combining the two I can show a really easy recipe that helps you use the discarded starter, preventing waste, and give you something easier to make than the sourdough itself.

Before we get to the recipe lets talk about the sourdough starter and the discard we are going to be using. If you are using your starter on a daily basis you will have a lot of discard and you might not want to bake with that everyday. Thankfully the discard can be kept in the fridge for a few days, topping up each time you feed the starter, or you can even freeze it. When you come to use the discard it is still important to smell it, if there is any off notes, any unpleasant smells these may translate to flavour in your recipe. If you store your starter in the fridge however you won’t have as much discard, you’ve already reduced your waste by slowing down the fermentation meaning the starter needs a lot less feeding. When I store my sourdough baby in the fridge I find it needs two rounds of feeding to bring it back to health and guess what? If you are filling my feeding schedule, two feeds will give you 200g of discard and that is exactly what this recipe calls for, it’s almost like I planned it that way.

Using sourdough discard in your recipes is also easier than you might think. Most sourdough starter recipes are made to be 100% hydration, that is to say with an equal weight of flour and water. This makes using the discard in a recipe straightforward because, say you have 100g of discard, you just divide the amount in half and take out 50g of flour and 50ml liquid from your existing recipe. Using discard in recipes like quick breads like banana bread or muffins, pancakes, waffles are the easiest things to use but you can even use it recipes such a chocolate cake, where the acidity would give a real boost to the chocolate flavour.

Sourdough Banana Bread Muffins
Makes 12

150g plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp fine sea salt
225g very ripe bananas (weighed without skin)
200g sourdough discard
1 tsp vanilla bean paste
150g unsalted butter, room temperature
185g light brown muscavado sugar
2 large eggs
200g dark chocolate, roughly chopped

Preheat the oven to 180ºC (160ºC Fan). Line a 12-hole muffin tray with paper liners.

In a bowl add the flour, baking powder and salt and whisk together to combine. In a separate bowl add the bananas and use a fork to mash. Pour in the sourdough discard and vanilla and stir until evenly mixed. Place the butter and sugar into a large bowl and using an electric mixer, cream together until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, beating until combined before adding the second. Add the flour mixture and gently fold to combine. Add the banana mixture and mix just until you have an evenly mixed batter. Finally add in about 2/3 of the chocolate and mix briefly to evenly distribute.

Divide the mixture evenly between the muffin paper, filling each one almost to the top. Scatter over the remaining chocolate and throw on a few cacoa nibs too if you like, dried banana chips could be nice too.

Bake in the preheated oven for about 20-22 minutes or until the muffins spring back to the touch. Remove from the oven and allow to cool in the pan for 10 minutes before carefully transferring the muffins to a wire rack to cool completely.

Kept in a sealed container these will keep for a couple days, they also freeze brilliantly