Because I can... CAKE!

[ruadhnait_aoife]

Call it post show blues, call it too much time on my hands - or womanly weakness - I was craving Chocolate Cake tonight...

So I decided that I was going to find a great vegan chocolate cake recipe.

I played with this one: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Vegan-Chocolate-Cake/Detail.aspx  and made it this:

Vegan Mint Frosting Recipe

Ingredients:

• 1 cups powdered (icing) sugar
• 1/2 tsp mint extract (from minced leaves)
• 1 tbsp fresh mint, minced
• 1 tbsp soy/rice milk

INGREDIENTS

• 1 1/2 cups rice flour
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1/4 cup cocoa powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/3 cup vegetable oil OR * I used 1/3 cup unsweetened applesauce
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon distilled white vinegar *used wine wine vinegar
• 1/2 cup water & ½ cup rice milk

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease one 9x5 inch loaf pan. *I used muffin liners in a muffin tray to make cupcakes....
2. Sift together the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda and salt. Add the oil, vanilla, vinegar and water. Mix together until smooth.
3. Pour into prepared pan and bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 45 minutes. Remove from oven and allow to cool.

Its baking now - 6 mins to go... while that was happening I craved frosting - and I saw something with mint in it out of the corner of my eye so I steeped some of my herb garden's chocolate mint leaves in hot water (about 2 tbsp's worth off the boil) - used it as extract then used the wet leaves as colour in the frosting mix (above) - it smells and tastes perfectly minty!

Now to frost and eat the suckers!


  the mint leaves steeping in boiling water and the frosting after its been all mixed together


  yummy! with leaves from my garden as a garnish :)

now the taste test:

  they taste pretty good - I think they need more thickening - maybe more milk and less water - they stuck to the sides a lot - but maybe thats because I didn't want to wait for them to fully cool...
But the frosting was to DIE for!  horray random experiments!