I don’t know about you, but for me whenever I go food shopping, as I scan the aisles it is there that I come up with endless ideas for new cakes and pastries.
That, along with my insatiable hunger cravings are the two most alluring factors.
As the end of summer is approaching, also ending is the abundance of fresh fruits and berries that come along with the season.
Knowing this, I decided to have one last hurrah with a few pounds of fresh strawberries to make this White Chocolate Strawberry Cake.
I thought, fresh strawberry compote with a douse of Grand Marnier cooked to a thick chunky preserve like consistency for the filling, between moist layers of white chocolate cake.
Now, if any of you know me you will know that I am not a big fan of white chocolate.
I just think it’s just too sweet and honestly it’s not really even chocolate, technically.
But without going into that whole topic, let me just say that I LOVE white chocolate baked into a cake!
I think you will love it too once you see how easy it is to make and the moistness from the cocoa butter makes this pound cake style cake a real winner to hold up the thick filling and white chocolate strawberry buttercream.
This is a building on recipes project as all great layer cake are; meaning we have to make several recipes to get to the final but it is well worth it!
Just follow along with my instruction and advice for making this easier: Prepare in advance!
You can make the strawberry compote, white chocolate drip ganache and even the cake layers several days ahead of time.
The buttercream too for that matter! I always work that way and then take just an hour or so on the day of the event to actually build the cake.
It just makes life so much easier and way more fun to bake with an organized plan.
In addition to the white chocolate in the recipes listed below you will need about 4 ounces more to dip the strawberries and shave on top of the finished cake
The Edible Gold Leaf is optional garnish
- For the Cake:
- Cake Flour 3 cups (360g)
- Granulated Sugar 1½ cup (300g)
- Baking Powder 3 teaspoons (15g)
- EnerG Egg Replacer 3 teaspoons (10g)
- Salt ¼ teaspoon
- Vegan Butter 9 Tablespoons (126g)
- Soy Milk 1 cup (237ml)
- Vanilla Extract 2 teaspoons (10ml)
- Vegan White Chocolate 6ounces (approx 1 cup chopped) (168g)
- For the Buttercream:
- 1 Recipe Aquafaba Swiss Buttercream
- Grand Marnier *optional 1 tablespoon
- Vegan White Chocolate 3 ounces
- For the Strawberry Filling:
- 2 Lbs fresh or frozen
- Sugar *optional to your taste
- Grand Marnier *optional 1 Tablespoon
- For the White Chocolate Drip:
- Vegan White Chocolate 2 ounces
- Soy Milk 2 Tablespoons (30ml)
- For the cake recipe:
- Combine the flour, baking powder, EnerG egg replacer, and salt in a mixer bowl and sift it together or mix on low to combine.
- Add the softened vegan butter nad mix for about 1 minute until it resembles coarse meal and is evenly incorporated
- Add the vanilla extract and then slowly pour in the soy milk while mixing on low to medium speed until it is all incorporated then increase the speed to medium-high for 1 minute to develop the batter
- Divide the batter into greased and parchment lined cake pans (I am using 7" cake pans but you can use 8" if that's all you have)
- Bake in a preheated 350°F oven for 20 minutes then turn the oven down to 300°F for another 15 minutes or until they springy to the touch when you gently press the centers.
- Cool the cakes while you prepare the strawberry compote
- Reserve about 1 cup of chopped fresh strawberries and then cook the remaining strawberries stirring often over medium heat until boiling, the berries will break down and release their juices but if they seem too dry add a few tablespoons of water to avoid scorching.
- Strain about ½ cup of the compote through a find mesh strainer to add to the buttercream for later
- Add the chopped strawberries to the cooled compote for the cake filling.
- Prepare the Aquafaba Swiss Buttercream as per the instructions on that recipe and add 1 -3 Tablespoons of Grand Marnier and 3 ounces of melted cooled white chocolate, then the reserved cooled puree.
- Assemble the cake as shown in the video tutorial
- The white chocolate drip is made by combining the white chocolate and soy milk together in a small saucepot over low heat and stirring constantly until it is melted and smooth, cool before pouring onto the buttercream cake.
4 Comments
Hi Gretchen! First of all, thank you so much for creating such delicious vegan recipes. I have been subscribed to your YouTube channel for a while now and I seem to print of every recipe of yours to try. I wanted to put in a small request, and that is to consider putting your vegan egg replacers in weight measurements as well? Reason for this is that we don’t have Ener-G egg replacer in my country, however, if I know how heavy the “egg” needs to be, I can sub my own vegan egg replacement recipe into this weight. Also, I do use a scale that goes below 1 gram, so if you ever feel like weighing your baking powder or baking soda as well that would be so amazing! The volume of the teaspoons in my country is different to the US, but with the weight I can ensure my measurements are identical to yours. Anyhoo, sorry for such a long comment. I’m just so excited to make this recipe, and also your tiramisu recipe. They all look fabulous! Thanks for all the great work. – Claire
Hi Claire! thank you! I typically do include the weights for even baking powder and soda (apologies if at times I forget!) As for the sub in for another brand of egg replacer, Im not sure it would be the same so just be careful there.
EnerG egg replacer includes Potato Starch, tapioca starch flour, leavening , calcium carbonate, citric acid, Sodium Carboxymethycellulose, Methylcellulose. 1½tsp od EnerG = 1 egg.
So my warning is to then use a different egg replacer with totally different ingredients it may not work exactly the same
For example when I use flax meal as the replacer, it is 1 Tbs for 1 egg, you can see how different egg replacers are not straight subs.
So again just be wary there and maybe do a small test first.
I get 3.3g per tsp of EnerG. (Ive updated the post too)
Hi Gretchen! Ive been following your recipes for a while, thats where I learned to make your fabulous SMB….Not really into vegan baking so my question is can I still get great results using non-vegan replacements and real eggs ….Thanks!
Hi Pam thank you! You can search for the white chocoalte cake on http://www.gretchensbakery.com I did this cake there first before I went vegan (there are over 400 blog posts and recipes still there)