For days, I didn’t know what to call this dessert. I couldn’t even decide if it should be a cake or cupcakes! Yet no matter what you call it or how you serve it, one thing is for sure –
It’s good.
What kind of cake is this?
Vegan Chocolate Umami Velvet Cake contains elements of three other popular cakes:
- Thunder Cake
- Red Velvet Cake
- Mahogany Cake
Thunder Cake
The idea for this recipe started when my oldest child read Thunder Cake by Patricia Polacco after not gravitating toward such short stories for a while. Set on a small farm, the main character Babushka teaches her granddaughter that fear does not imply cowardness as they gather ingredients for a chocolate cake in the face of an impending storm. The young girl insists she’s scared of the low rumbling, the cranky hen, the aggressive cow, the wooded shed, and the high trellis from which she must harvest the secret ingredient –
tomatoes. By the time my own child was reading the recipe on the last page, I was thinking I could make a vegan red velvet cake with ketchup.
Ketchup in Cake
I had no idea the Big Red HEINZ Ketchup Cake is a revitalized (reviralized?) TikTok trend.
Here are my thoughts which converged independent of the viral recipe:
- Tomatoes are naturally red…
- Modern red velvet cake is artificially red. Some recipe developers attempt to sidestep food coloring with beet powder, but this ingredient can be hard to find and creates a fuschia batter…
- A velvet cake is leavened with baking soda and acidic dairy ingredients (typically buttermilk)…
- I use soy milk and vinegar to make vegan buttermilk…
- Vinegar is in ketchup…
- Ketchup is naturally red…
Therefore, I could make a naturally red vegan red velvet cake with ketchup!
Ketchup in Ketchup
My hope splintered when I noticed onion powder in even the simplest ketchup product. More concerningly, different ketchups contain different amounts (and forms) of salt and sugar; if we don’t use the same one, your cake could be a textural or gustatory fail!
Tomatoes and Vinegar in Cake
Red tomatoes and acidic vinegar are why I gravitated toward ketchup. Instead of using such a wild card condiment, however, I settled on the simpler, more predictable combination of tomato paste and apple cider vinegar.
Red Velvet Cake
Of all the things I could call this dessert, “red” isn’t one of them. It’s velvet though! Velvet cakes emerged during the Victorian era when baking soda became a pantry staple. Drier yeast- and more finicky meringue-leavened cakes gradually lost their favor to “velvet” cakes leavened with baking soda and acidic dairy ingredients. The latter were moister, easier, and more reliably successful desserts.
Vegan Buttermilk
One of the easiest vegan substitutions is buttermilk: 15 Tbsp (225 mL/g) soy, pea, or almond milk whisked with 1 Tbsp (15 mL/g) vinegar or lemon juice replaces 1 cup (240 mL/g) buttermilk.
No, buttermilk isn’t buttered milk! It’s actually leaner than whole milk as it’s the milk leftover from making butter. It’s also acidic. Partnered with basic baking soda, buttermilk – vegan or otherwise – creates the iconic volcano experiment inside your baked good causing it to rise.
Mahogany Cake
Mahogany cake could be dubbed the OG red velvet cake. Before blood-red velvet cake became a baker’s dream, mahogany cake was content to sport an in-between hue similar to cherry wood (or, you know, mahogany). Unfortunately, once the more dramatic red velvet emerged in the 1920s, mahogany was practically forgotten.
Its unassuming hue is a natural consequence of baking soda and unprocessed cocoa. The chocolate powder turns red(dish)!
Natural vs. Dutch-Process Cocoa
Beyond color, the type of cocoa you use has chemical implications for your baking. Natural or unprocessed cocoa is acidic. Chocolate recipes with this type lean on basic baking soda for rise.
Dutch-process cocoa, by contrast, is more basic and less bitter. They are not interchangeable! A recipe with this type likely leans on baking powder for rise.
Baking powder, after all, is baking soda and an acidic powder (usually cream of tartar). By bringing its own low-pH acid to the kitchen game, baking powder compensates for the higher pH of Dutch-process cocoa.
Vegan Thunder Not-Red Velvet Mahogany Cake
So, is this Vegan Thunder Cake? Vegan Red Velvet Cake? Vegan Mahogany Cake?
YES
- It’s thunder cake because of the tomato paste, but not because of how it’s leavened. (Thunder Cake is partially leavened with meringue.)
- It’s red velvet cake because of how it’s leavened, but not because it’s red.
- It’s mahogany cake because of how it’s colored, but not because it includes tomato paste.
Yet a recipe named Vegan Thunder Not-Red Velvet Mahogany Cake is destined to flop.
What’s in a name?
The answer to this question also explains why this cake is so good. The best reviews come from my favorite, typically frosting-and-finished family members:
I like the cake, and I like the frosting, and I like the cake with the frosting!
Me too!!
Uncharacteristically, not a crumb escaped my children’s plates or mouths. Perhaps I should call it Ooh, Mommy! Velvet Cake? But there are practical and scientific reasons why Chocolate Umami Velvet Cake works.
Chocolate Umami Cake
Let’s review the five tastes:
- Sweet
- Salty
- Sour
- Bitter
- Umami
Practically Speaking
Chocolate is frequently paired with 1-4. Sweetened chocolate is one of the two most common flavor offerings, and in the late 2000s, salted chocolate desserts became almost as ubiquitous.
Sweetened chocolate with sour foods has been a popular combination for even longer. (Think of chocolate cheesecakes made with sour cream, or chocolate mousses and puddings served with tart berries.) Plus, what’s a coffee shop without caffe mocha, chocolate and bitter coffee, on its menu?
By contrast, chocolate and umami coexist largely in savory applications like Mexican mole. Select recipe writers incorporate miso in their tarts or cookies, but overall, the world of chocolate and umami confections is waiting to be explored.
And I’m ready!
Scientifically Speaking
Chocolate Umami Velvet Cake stimulates your entire tongue. Sugar and salt activates the front rim of this muscle; cream cheese, the back sides; chocolate, the far back; tomato paste, the juicy center. No taste bud is left behind!
SIDEBAR – NOT Spice Cake
Tomato paste contributes glutamates, the umami compounds, to this cake. Chocolate tomato cakes aren’t new; there are the aforementioned Thunder and ketchup cakes, as well as Campbell’s Tomato Soup Cake.
These cakes make hiding tomatoes their job. Thunder Cake includes ½ cup (120 mL) cocoa which overpowers the tomato purée. Similarly, ketchup and Campbell’s Tomato Soup cakes mask their tomato products with warm spices such as cinnamon, allspice, cloves, and nutmeg.
I wanted balance. Yet less cocoa and fewer spices felt risky! If I only used cinnamon and/or added cayenne, would my cake be too reminiscent of Mexican mole? If I used allspice or cloves, would my diners think of Worcestershire sauce?
better leave ‘em out.
Velvet Cake
For me, the sign of a good cake on the WWW is texture. Look closely and you’ll see many cake layers with beautifully fluffy tops but dismayingly denser bottoms.
not my cakes! I hyper-focus on all the critical measurements including:
- base/acid relationship
- wet:dry ratio
- oven temperature
- cook time
Recall the base/acid relationship is what defines this as a vegan velvet cake: basic baking soda is partially activated by acidified soy or pea milk (in place of conventional buttermilk) to create a uniformly tender crumb.
Vegan Chocolate Umami Velvet Cake
The only thing left to do is try it!
Vegan Chocolate Umami Velvet Cake
Description
The frosting measurements assume you wish to frost the middle, top, and sides of your cakes or 15 cupcakes. To frost only the middle and top (or top and sides) of a 2-layer cake without leftovers, use the following measurements:
- about 4.5 oz (129 g) dairy-free cream cheese
- about 3 Tbsp plus 1 tsp (50 mL/47 g) dairy-free butter
- about 2 2/3 cups (652 mL/326 g) powdered sugar
makes 2, 8-in/20-cm round cakes or 15 large cupcakes plus frosting
Ingredients
Cake
Frosting
Instructions
Prepare
-
Bring "milk", "butter", "cream cheese", and any other chilled ingredients to room temperature.
-
Preheat oven to 350°F/180°C. Spray and line 2, 8-in/20-cm round cake pans with parchment, or distribute 15 liners between 2 cupcake pans.
Cake
-
Whisk "milk" and vinegar in a sm or med mixing bowl. Set aside.
-
In a second sm or med mixing bowl, measure flour, baking soda, and salt. Sift in cocoa, then whisk well and set aside.
-
Add oil, tomato paste, and vanilla to soy or pea milk mixture. Whisk vigorously to emulsify.
-
With an electric mixer on hi, cream granulated sugar and "butter" in a lg bowl. Add wet ingredients, then beat on med until thoroughly combined; add dry ingredients, then beat on lo until thoroughly combined.
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Evenly divide batter between cake pans or cupcake wells.
You should have slightly more than 1 kg of batter. (I typically have 1,110 g to be exact). If you have a food scale, weight 500-550 g into each cake pan, or 70-75 g into each cupcake well. -
Bake cakes 30-35 min; cupcakes, 25-30 min. Wait about 2 hrs, until completely cool before frosting.
Frosting & Assembly
-
Meanwhile, place "cream cheese" and "butter" in a lg bowl, then beat on hi until uniformly colored and creamy.
-
Add half the powdered sugar. Beat on low to combine, then on med to smooth. Repeat with remaining half.
-
Frost, assemble, and/or garnish cake or cupcakes as desired.
Note
If you want an oddball cake ingredient masked, try my veganized Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake. You won't be able to tell there's mayo in it!
Learn why I recommend Country Crock and Violife. I may also have a reverse-engineered recipe for any recommendations you can't find!
