The reasons for not using animal products may vary. But what about sweet pastries, where eggs, milk, cream, butter and cottage cheese are almost always present?
Does rejection of fats and animal proteins mean farewell to the “sweet life”?
Homemade Lean Cake - General Cooking Principles
There are a staggering number of recipes for cakes and other confectionery with ingredients of animal origin, but for people on a diet, convinced vegetarians who keep posts related to religious beliefs, everything is not that simple.
Conventional pastries and pastries, according to the recipe and cooking technology, among other ingredients, include:
- Milk;
- Cottage cheese;
- Butter;
- Cream;
- Eggs;
- Gelatin.
For lean baking, these products are unacceptable, but sweets, however, are not excluded from the diet. Among vegetable products, you can choose a substitute for animal fats and proteins, with the same physical and biochemical properties, so that recipes for cooking fasting cake at home are as large as possible.
The food industry has developed and manufactured a number of special products that replace, for example, milk and dairy products:
- almonds,
- coconut,
- soybean,
- peanuts,
- flax,
- seaweed.
Of the listed plants, butter, milk, cream, cottage cheese are obtained, since their biochemical composition is close to the content of proteins, fats and essential amino acids in dairy products of animal origin. These products can be purchased or cooked on their own, but in this case, baking the lean cake at home will take longer.
You can use to prepare the dough any refined vegetable oil, available in the kitchen. The main condition for the use of unrefined oil: its smell should harmoniously complement the flavor of the confection. If nuts are present in the lean cake, you can safely add the same butter to the dough. For creams in the lean cake is better to use coconut oil, made in an industrial environment. It has sufficient fat content, which will provide the cream with the desired structure, similar in appearance to a cream (natural) cream.
The next point: in any baking gelatin, which is known to have animal origin, is used quite often. You can replace it with agar-agar, made from algae. In addition, two or three egg whites can be replaced with an aqueous solution of agar, in a ratio of one to two: agar - 1 part, water - 2 parts. So you can get an analogue of protein-nut (air) dough or protein cream.
Porous and lush dough structure in lean baking can be provided by baking powder, ammonium, baking powder or ordinary baking soda, quenched with vinegar or any sour juice - for baking, it is better to use lemon juice that is neutral in taste and smell.
Important point: if you use soda as a baking powder, remember that its excess, besides the volume, will give the dough a specific taste, not very pleasant, and the dough will turn out dark and dry. To avoid this, use soda in combination with ammonium (1: 1). All baking powder you need to try to add at the very least, before sending the dough into the oven: you need to make sure that the baking powder’s reaction ends at the moment when the product is already covered with a golden brown crust. This will ensure baking has a maximum lift.
To achieve the moisture content of the finished dough, in addition to water or coconut (soy) milk, you can use fruit or vegetable puree (apples, bananas, pumpkin, carrots).
Any cake should have a flavor that is characteristic of the confection, so you cannot do without using vanilla, cinnamon, cocoa, citrus. Especially these components will help to neutralize undesirable smells of baking powder, which in ordinary, unsightly, baking help to hide milk proteins and fats of animal origin. Therefore, the volume of all vegetable flavors, to improve the taste, in lean products is better to increase at least one and a half times.
Recipe 1. Lenten cake at home, with apple marshmallow in chocolate
For cake layers:
• Wheat flour 250 - 300 g
• Flour, potato 75-80 g
• Vanilla 5 g
• Cocoa (80%) 150 g
• Orange Peel 20 g (fresh)
• Sugar 75 g
• Ammonium - 10 g
• Powder, baking 30 g
• Peanut Butter100 ml
• Milk, soy - 300 ml
• salt
For impregnation:
• Orange syrup 300 ml
For a layer of apple marshmallow:
• 150 ml - water
• 750 g - sugar
• 6 pcs. - large apples
• 30 g - agar
• Vanilla or orange peel
For the glaze:
• Soy cream 50-70 ml
• Chocolate, bitter 200 g
• Coconut oil 70 g
• Sugar - 80 g
• Vanilla 2 g
Preparation:
Before starting work, preheat the oven and prepare the baking dish. Flour, sugar and cocoa powder combine and mix.
In a separate bowl, pour in the butter and, whipping it with a whisk, gradually add the milk, without stopping the beating.
Add orange zest and vanilla. In the resulting mass to enter one spoon, mixed with sugar and cocoa powder, flour.
Ammonium and baking powder add to the dough just before sending it to the oven.
Readiness of baked cake is checked with a match.
Remove from the mold and cut it can be after complete cooling. Divide into two layers and soak the cakes with cooled orange syrup, made from natural juice and an equal amount of sugar.
We leave them at 4-5 hours for proofing.
Cooking marshmallows for spreading the cake. Soak 25 g of agar in water (150 ml), and when it swells, melt in a water bath. Bake 6 apples (you can in the microwave) and mash them, removing the core and peel. Add 350 g of sugar and 1/3 part of melted agar to the apple sauce (add the solution of agar instead of egg white). Beat until fluffy mass. Aromatize orange peel or vanilla. In the remaining part of the dissolved agar we add the second half of the sugar for making marshmallow, and boil the syrup until the filament is formed, stirring it continuously in a water bath.
Hot syrup needs to be injected in a puree in a thin stream, beating up to steady peaks. Part of the finished zephyr mass lay on the bottom cake. Squeeze the remaining mass onto parchment paper, powdered with powdered sugar, using a pastry bag and a large figured nozzle. When the marshmallow, laid out on the cake, hardens a little, put the second cake on it and cover the cake with icing. To do this, boil soy cream, melt the sugar, coconut oil and chocolate in them. You can cover the cake with warm icing so as not to melt the marshmallow. To decorate, put marshmallow on the parchment on the surface of the cake. Top it with a thin thread of chocolate coating. Decorate the surface with berries.
Recipe 2. Lean cake at home, sandy with orange-pumpkin souffle
For cake:
• Mix flour (wholegrain and premium) 350 - 400 g
• Fresh, orange 150 ml
• Orange Peel 50 g
• Unrefined sugar 300 g (and 70 g for the dough)
• Water 150 ml
• Ammonium powder 20 g
• Agar - 40 g
• Coconut oil (food) 150 g
• Vanilla 3g
• Coconut or chocolate chips.
• Pumpkin Puree 200 g
Preparation:
Take a package for roasting and pour 1.5-2 kg of peas into it and tie it so that the grain does not get enough sleep. Form sent, oiled, parchment paper. Heat the oven to 180 - 200 ° C. Getting to the dough:
Pour the butter into the blender and gradually add water (necessarily ice!) To it, beat it with sugar and water at high speed. Pour mixtures of flour, salt, sugar and vanilla powder onto the work surface. Gradually add the oil emulsion, knead the dough. The rolled dough layer must be larger than the diameter of the mold so that it covers the rim. Put the dough in the form, put a bag of peas on top and send it to the oven.
Pour the orange juice into agar-agar. In mashed pumpkin, grated on a fine grater, pour the sugar and zest of fresh orange. Stew until soft in a skillet. To prevent burning, add a little water and coconut oil. Boil juice with agar until thickened, and then pour it into pumpkin puree, whipping until a homogeneous and fluffy mass.
Cool the baked “basket” of dough in the form, fill it with pumpkin-orange souffle. Cake will be tastier if the night stands Therefore, it is better to bake it the day before.
Recipe 3. Lenten cake at home, with fruit
For cake:
• Oranges 2 pcs.
• Pineapple Rings 1/2 Banks
• Soda10
• Lemon 1/2 pcs.
• Jam (any) - for impregnating cakes
• Starch 25 g.
• Cashew nut roast 150 g
• Oil, peanut 50 ml
• Kiwi 1 pc.
• Unrefined sugar 220 g
• Grapes (berries) 200 g
• Wheat flour 250 g
• Milk, coconut (or almond, soy) 200 ml • Agar 50g
• Vanilla powder 4 g
Preparation:
Squeeze the juice from citrus (250 ml), after removing from them the zest. Pour the fresh and 50 ml of peanut butter into a blender. Add starch, half sugar, salt and zest of fresh oranges. Beat the mass at high speed. Switching the blender to the minimum speed, pour out the flour. When the dough is almost ready, add a teaspoon of soda, mix and pour it on a baking tray (or in the form). Korzh lay out of the form on a napkin, turning it over. Leave it for half an hour.
For the cream, pour in a blender 100 g of cashew, the same amount of sugar, add vanilla and salt. In water (250 ml) we dissolve the agar-agar and let it boil. Pour the hot mass into a blender, to nuts and milk, and turn it on to beat at maximum speed. Meanwhile, cut in half the cooled cake and lubricate the bottom layer of jam and cover the top of the cake. Peeled and chopped fruits are laid in a deep detachable shape. Top we pour them with cream, whipped in a blender, and on top of it we spread the parts of the cake connected with jam. We send the finished cake for proofing in the cold. When the agar-agar hardens, put the cake on a plate, turning it over.
Recipe 4. Lenten cake at home with berry jelly, without baking
For cake:
Cookies 400 g
Oil, vegan (any) 50 g
Vanilla
Milk, soy 200 - 250 ml
Berry jelly (red currant, gooseberry) 300 g
Agar 70g
Preparation:
For this lean cake at home any vegan biscuit (without milk and eggs), which can be seen on the shelves of supermarkets, will do.
The recipe - in a hurry. If in homemade preparations there are a couple of jars of jelly juice, then this cake can be prepared in 20 minutes.
Milk and butter mix in a blender. If the cookie is not sweet, but you want to make the cake sweeter, add sugar to the milk. A little vanilla, to create the flavor of this cake. We dilute half of the agar indicated in the recipe in 100 ml of water, boiling, add to coconut milk with butter. In the liquid mass throw the pieces of cookies, without turning off the blender. Spread a homogeneous mass in a detachable form and dub the surface. Lay out your favorite berries or fruits on top, pour the jelly out of the jar into the mold and put it into the cold to set. If the jelly in the jars is not dense enough and there is no certainty that it will retain the desired shape, then add to it the pre-dissolved agar, bring it to the boil and pour it into the form already warm.
Recipe 5. Lenten cake at home, puffed with custard
For cake:
• Flour 0.5 kg (approximately)
• Milk, soy 1 l
• Soda 4 pm L.
• Lime juice
• Water
• Coconut oil 150 g
• Vanilla
• Sugar 300 g
• Chopped nuts (any) 250 - 350 g
Preparation:
Sift flour (about 400 g) on the work surface, make a recess. Pour soda into a cup with lime (lemon) juice. When the hissing stops, spread the soda into the flour. Add 4-5 spoons of coconut oil. For the test, you can use any vegetable oil with a neutral smell, but the dough should be fatty. Sugar in the dough do not add. Knead the dough like for noodles. First, the oil is kneaded, and then water is added, as needed. Cut the dough into 8 identical pieces, first roll them into a ball, and then work with a rolling pin, making very thin, almost transparent, round sheets. Use the remaining flour to roll out the dough. We bake on one sheet, in a very hot oven. Leave to cool and prepare the cream. Pour milk into the pan (non-stick), add sugar and vanilla. In a small amount of milk we dilute 3 full spoons of flour, and when the milk boils in the pan, pour in the second part, without stopping the intensive stirring in the pan. Cook at the lowest heat until a thick mass is formed, set aside from the stove for cooling. In the cooled mass add coconut oil and beat until cooked. Each layer is lubricated with cream, prutrichiva roasted and chopped nuts. The cake needs at least 12 hours to settle, for impregnation.
Recipe 6. Lenten cake at home, biscuit cream
For sponge cake:
• Sugar 180 g
• Oil 150 ml
• Wheat flour 400 g
• Natural Apple Juice 250 ml
• Soda 20 g
• Ammonium 15 g
• Vanilla
For cream:
• Manka 3 table. Spoons
• Coconut oil 100 ml
• Sugar 180 g
• Vanilla
• Juice, natural (peach) 300 ml
Preparation:
We start with the preparation of baking molds for biscuit cake and preheating the oven. From the juice and oil to make an emulsion. Mix all the loose components until smooth and inject the dry mixture into the emulsion, stirring the dough continuously from bottom to top. Immediately pour into the mold and quickly send to the oven. To prepare the cream, boil the juice with sugar and vanilla. In the boiling liquid pour the semolina, stirring, cook until thick. When the mixture is cool, add the butter, beat until ready. The cream, increasing in volume, should acquire a slightly yellowish tint. We coat both parts of biscuit with cream and form a cake. Decoration can be any fruit or berries.
Recipe 7. Lenten cake at home, carrot-orange
For cake:
• Flour 200-250 g
• Walnut, 150 g
• Sugar 200 g
• salt
• Vanilla 2 g
• Baking powder 25 g
• grated carrot 150 g
• Oil, vegetable (odorless) 140 g
• Orange juice, with pulp, - 250 ml
• Orange Peel
For cream:
• Chocolate, bitter 100 g
• Unrefined sugar 220 g
• Coconut oil 140 g
• Vanilla
• Coconut milk (or almond) 250 ml
• Roasted flour 120 g
Preparation:
Roast the nuts (in a dry frying pan). Oil (any vegetable, odorless) combine with sugar, juice; add grated carrots and orange zest, chopped nuts. In flour, pour the vanilla and baking powder, mix well. Combine dry and liquid mass, pour it into a pre-prepared form. At 200 degrees baked 40 minutes.
In a glass of vegan milk with sugar and vanilla, pour the flour fried to cream-colored (fry without butter) and pieces of natural, dark chocolate. A lot to cook until thick consistency, stirring continuously. When the cream is cool, add coconut oil and beat with a mixer.
Korzh split in half and fluff inside and outside chocolate cream. Decorate with fruits and nuts.
Recipe 8. Lenten cake at home “Harmony”
For cake:
Honey 70 g
Unrefined sugar 200 g
Citrus zest, fresh 40-50g
Cocoa 50 g
Chopped nuts 70-80 g
Vanilla (crystals) 5 g
Oil 120 ml
Sifted flour (wheat) 400 g
Raisin 90 g
Warm water (up to 40 degrees) 200 ml
Baking powder (or ammonium) 50 g
Interlayer:
Jam 200g
For decoration:
Chocolate, black (bitter)
Sesame Icing, white
Confectionery sugar (topping for pask)
Preparation:
Combine water, oil and sugar in deep dishes. Heat them to 40 degrees, but do not boil. In the heated mixture dissolve honey. In a separate container, combine the dry ingredients and pour the heated liquid into the dry mixture. It should make the dough creamy consistency. Pour it into a detachable form, lined with parchment. Baked cake after proving divide into two parts and richly covered with jam or jam cake in the cut. Combine the cakes and pour the top with melted chocolate and sugar glaze. Top with chocolate sprinkle with sesame seeds, and the white part of the glaze - colored sugar powder.
Lean Cake at Home - Tips and Tips
• If wheat flour is combined with a spoon of starch and a semolina spoon, the product will be moist and porous. For lean baking is also better to use a mixture of flour of different varieties.
• A tablespoon of ground white flax seed, soaked in three spoons of water, will replace the egg in the dough.
• Do not rush to remove the finished product from the mold. Wait for it to cool in shape. Top with a dry cloth, and under the form lay a wet. Any yeast-free dough in this case will retain freshness for a long time.
• Do not rush to throw away the burnt cake: rub it with a fine grater to remove the burnt layer.
• Depending on storage conditions, flour may have varying degrees of moisture. Therefore, strictly adhere to the number specified in the recipe is not necessary. Focus on organoleptic methods for determining its quantity in the recipe.
• Excess sugar often makes the dough not sweeter, but harder. The dough rises poorly, and the finished product turns out dry, hard and “rubber”. Remember that excessive sugar consumption is harmful to the body. In addition, taste buds in the mouth do not react to the amount of sugar in food, but to its presence in general. Add this ingredient in reasonable quantities so that the cake or pie is light and sprinkle the product with powdered sugar on top to make it seem very sweet.
