Things That Are Dairy-Free: Chocolate Cake

Over the last several months, since we discovered The Imp's allergy to all things milk, I've been looking for dairy-free substitutes for some of my old tried-and-true favourites. I refuse to accept that having an allergy means all the fun stuff is off-limits! For chocolate cake, fortunately, my old tried-and-true was already dairy-free, a fact I didn't even realize until I really started paying attention. The cake is actually vegan, although that's not its raison-d'être. It's not from a vegan or health-food cookbook, in fact it's adapted from the most basic of cookbooks: Betty Crocker's New Cookbook, which I've had forever. (I have the 8th edition.) It's deliciously moist and chocolatey, and dead simple to make. It's been my go-to cake recipe for years - long before The Imp's allergy made it a necessity.

Toddler approved! The Imp enjoys his 2nd birthday cake.

This post also features this cake (with photos), in our life pre-non-dairy. So easy a toddler can make it!

The recipe below makes one layer in a 8 inch square or round pan. For two layers, make the recipe twice. For three, make it three times, etc. For a larger cake like the one pictured in this post, double the recipe and bake each layer in a 13 x 9 inch pan.

I haven't tried it, but I'm sure you could make cupcakes with this recipe too - the cooking time would be much shorter.

Anyway, on to the ingredients:

1 2/3 cups flour
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup pure baking cocoa powder (I like
Fry's)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup water
1/3 cup vegetable oil (I use canola)
1 teaspoon white vinegar
1 teaspoon vanilla


Heat oven to 350 degrees F.

And here's why it's so easy. Mix all the dry ingredients with a fork right in the cake pan - ungreased. Then stir in all the wet ingredients. When well mixed, stick it in the oven for about 30 - 40 minutes. Voilà.

That's the recipe more or less as it appears in the book. I often have a heavier hand with the cocoa powder, using 1/3 of a cup - how can cake be too chocolatey, I ask you? Also since I'm not a fan of super-sweet, I go a bit lighter on the sugar - a scant cup, unpacked.

My oven tends to run a bit hot, so I start checking it at the 25 minute mark. When a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out clean, it's done. Baking too long will result in a dry, crumbly cake. So don't do that!

I usually make 2 - 3 layers at once, then assemble them with jam and/or fresh fruit as a filling between the layers and pour melted chocolate chips (the Safeway Organic brand chocolate chips are a rare dairy-free option) thinned with soymilk over the top as a ganache-style frosting.

I am, however, looking for good dairy-free frosting recipes. Suggestions welcome!

Things That Are True - Toddlers and Chocolate Cake

It's possible that we are bad parents; we did not go all out and have a big theme party for The Imp's second birthday. I thought about inviting friends to join us for an afternoon of kids running around shrieking in the park close to our apartment, but the Vancouver weather's been dreadful and 900 square feet of living space does not make the "If it rains we'll just go inside" concept exactly workable. So we had a simple but fun family dinner with his adored older cousins the Sunday before, complete with off key but enthusiastic singing, lots of presents, and birthday cake.

The morning The Imp actually turned two, we sang him "Happy Birthday" again first thing in the morning. To him, this meant birthday! cake! should follow almost immediately. Not having any on hand at 8am (clearly bad planning on our part), we promised him there would be some birthday! cake! after dinner that evening. Off he went to daycare, I got to work, picked him up early, and we headed to an afternoon meetup with other moms, kids, and Erica from yummymummyclub.ca. None of which involved cake, and all of which prompted The Imp to remind me of the promise made to him at breakfast.

When we got home, The Imp helped me mix up a quick one layer cake and I threw it into the oven. It was done and out on a cooling rack awaiting frosting on the kitchen counter. HWSNBN and I were sitting in the living room puzzling over what to throw together for the evening meal. The Imp was in the kitchen playing with his fridge magnets. We weren't paying as much attention to him as maybe we should have been.

The Imp has developed the charming habit, as he learns new words and expressions daily, of narrating things as he does them. Like, "I hugging Daddy," and "I climbing the chair."

You can see where this is going, can't you?



The Imp's little sing-song voice gradually entered our conscious hearing: "I eating the cake! I eating the cake!" he chanted gleefully.

HWSNBN and I ran into the kitchen to find The Imp sitting on the floor, chocolate crumbs all around him, chocolate cake crammed into his mouth, chocolate morsels smushed into his little hands, his t-shirt, his hair. He was, indeed, eating the cake.

 The Imp's handiwork, of which he was most proud

Us: (exasperated) Imp! What did you do?
Imp: Grin.
Us: (ask a stupid question...) Did you eat the cake?
Imp: (looking at us very seriously, then suddenly beaming) Happy Birthday!

So we all ate chocolate cake for dinner. Maybe we're awesome parents after all.

Things That Are True - And Now We Are Two

Mere seconds after The Imp first graced us with his presence

The Imp turns one, and there is much rejoicing

Celebrating The Imp's second birthday

How did that little tiny boy who taught me how to be a mom become this big boisterous two year old? 

Oh, the milestones; they are so bittersweet.

Things I'm Doing - Fit By Forty: Week 3

If you're new here and want to know more about my Fit by Forty efforts, you can go here and here for some background and also check out Week 1 and Week 2. 

Week 3 - The New Normal

They say it takes three weeks to form new habits. They, the mysterious they that seem to be not only experts on everything that ever existed anywhere in the universe, but also have been behind every cabal, plot, scheme and conspiracy with new ones being hatched daily. They are very busy people. Whoever they are.

By the end of Week 3 I no longer had cravings for The Bad Food, unless I watched TV. (Because those ads for too-sweet, over-salted frankenfood will simultaneously repulse you and make you want to eat that crap Right! Now!) My body had grown more accustomed to the exercise; I felt stronger, I had more energy, I was (when The teething Imp would let me) sleeping better longer. We didn't have to buy the Costco-sized Advil container this week.

Eating
Portion control: what a negative way of phrasing it. The word "control" implies restriction, policing of food intake. Like "crowd control" it doesn't have any fun connotations. It also sounds far too clinical to describe the joyful act of eating. Food is such a primal thing. Feeding yourself, feeding your family is one of the greatest sensual experiences in life. And by sensual, I refer to "of the senses", not "in the bedroom". Although breakfast in bed has its joys too.

Rather than the dietician sounding, desensitized phrase "portion control" I prefer to make it simpler. I'm not measuring my food. I'm not counting calories or calculating grams of fat. I prefer to say I eat only when I'm hungry and I stop eating when I'm no longer hungry. I make healthy choices ninety percent of the time. I'm not depriving myself, after all, this was the week of The Awesome Chocolate Birthday Cake of Doom. And yes, I enjoyed a slice of it, without apology and without regret.

Side note: maybe "Without apology and without regret" is what should go on my non-tombstone bench memorial thing. Must tell HWSNBN.

Takeway:
Eating is enjoyable. It's family time as often as possible with HWSNBN's long hours. It's one of those most basic things in life that bring us happiness. I will not let a get-fit-lose-weight plan take the focus off the fun, the joy, or the chocolate. But not hoovering back everything The Imp leaves behind on his plate does help with the goal-achieving.

Exercise
More of the same, except better, faster, stronger. Made it up a couple of hills I'd been struggling with - when I shifted down into the granny gears on my bike, but still. Added more stair climbing this week to up the cardio challenge. But for the most part, my trusty bicycle remained my go-to exercise choice. I also was fortunate enough, this week, to meet and have dinner with the awe-inspiring four time winter Olympian Sharon Firth. Listening to her speak about the work she now does in the small communities of the Northwest Territories to inspire youth to achieve excellence was incredibly humbling, and made me even more determined to model healthy, active living for The Imp.

Takeaway:
Don't fix what ain't broken. I like the bicycle, the bicycle is easy to implement into my daily life. And The Imp likes the bicycle too. If it ever starts to feel stale, I'll find something else. Right now, it's exactly the right thing.


And now, for the numbers:
Starting weight: 149 lbs
Week 1 weight loss: 3.5 lbs
Week 2 weight loss: 3 lbs
Week 3 weight loss: 2 lbs
New weight: 140.5 lbs

Also, I need to find a trusty-steed type name for my bicycle. Any suggestions?

Things I've Learned - Helping Mummy!

My sister-in-law is celebrating her 50th birthday today. I'm the designated birthday-cake-maker in the family, so this morning I was up early looking through recipes for something worthy of the occasion. Cake, filling & frosting chosen, I got out ingredients and got ready to bake. The Imp picked that very moment to become desperately in need of my attention, clinging to my leg and insisting "Up, Mummy!" repeatedly. He WOULD NOT like to go read books with Daddy, thank you very much.

He was, however, delighted to help me stir flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt together.

And the problem with child labour would be...?

Well, I guess the problem with child workers is their tendency to eat the product.

Given that The Imp a) never stops moving, and b) has the attention span of a... well, an almost 2 year old, I was surprised at how diligent he was about stirring things together. He stuck with it until it was all mixed together, and then worked at it again once we added the wet ingredients. I can't even begin to describe how much fun he had - and how much I loved it. It's not often I recognize those perfect moments for what they are as they're happening. This morning I knew. As I stood there next to him, The Imp dressed in his too-big hand-me-down jammies on the chair pulled up to the kitchen counter, fork in hand, enthusiastically stirring cake batter, I knew.

This was one of those moments. I was so overcome with happiness that I had to struggle not to cry. I will remember the look on his face until the day I die. He was perfectly happy, stirring with purpose, saying proudly as he smiled up at me, "Helping Mummy!"

Happy sigh.


Daddy held him at a safe distance while the cakes went in to the oven.

Cake layers cooling on racks prior to filling/frosting
Far left is the layer The Imp made

Right then, dabbing a wee speck of sentiment from my eyes, on to frosting.

The genesis of cream cheese frosting


Add pure cocoa powder & icing sugar

Like most things in life, it needed more chocolate...

...and Kahlua.

And strawberries & whipped cream, of course.

Now for the assembly:

At this point in the process, I had to stop taking photos as things were getting a little messy. The four layers stacked were somewhat lacking in structural integrity. (Let's just say it's not an earthquake-proof cake.) And then the cream cheese frosting wasn't sticking to the whipped cream and the whole thing threatened to devolve into not so much cake as birthday pudding. I live in fear of the car journey to my sister-in-law's house.

I did manage to use ALL the frosting and filling, so.

The finished product:




The takeaway:

My husband and I were talking this afternoon about the things we remember from our childhood; the things that made us really happy. For him it was going skating with his whole family every weekend in the winter. For me it was sitting under a tropical night sky with my dad and having him teach me the constellations of the southern hemisphere.

We realized one of those Important Truths. It's not the fancy birthday party, the cool new bike, the "event" moments in our childhood that stick with us. It's the simple time spent standing on a kitchen chair with your mom stirring together your first cake.