Classic Old-fashioned Gingerbread cake that is vegan, oil-free, whole grain and out of this world delicious, moist and full of amazing flavor from cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, allspice, cloves and molasses.
I’m so happy to have this post up for this Vegan Gingerbread Cake! I was editing my video last night and was sooo sleepy. Next thing I know, I woke up with my head laying flat on the desk, no lie. I literally fell asleep while typing, haha. I don’t think I’ve ever done that. Is that not hilarious or what? But, CAKE is here, so it’s all good.
Meet one of my all-time favorite cakes. I’m a huge spice cake lover and my favorite is gingerbread. The smells and depth of flavor….I can’t get enough. I originally started testing this cake recipe last holiday season. But I never got around to making it exactly perfect or posting in time last year, so here we are. Better late than never, right?
This is my favorite gingerbread cake to date. I used to make one back in the day that was filled with eggs, oil and sugar. Not only is this one healthier by a mile, it is better. That is how unbelievably delicious this cake is.
I admit I’m super picky when it comes to gingerbread cake. I need all the classic gingerbread spices found in old-fashioned gingerbread cake and especially, cloves! Cloves provide that extra deep flavor that specifically make gingerbread taste like that undeniable gingerbread. Classic gingerbread should be slightly dense, without being heavy, but spongy, fluffy soft and incredibly moist. They are notorious for their amazing, moist texture. This is due to the molasses and typically butter/oil content. If you look at classic gingerbread cakes, they always have that perfect flat, moist top. Once I finally nailed the recipe, it was pure glory. And the texture, my friends…I came up with the most perfect flour blend ever for this cake. The texture and crumb of this cake is amazing. It’s firm, slices beautifully, doesn’t fall apart and is perfectly soft.
Classic gingerbread cake is topped with simple powdered sugar or whipped cream. This is so a frosting doesn’t compete with the flavor awesomeness happening underneath.
I created my own Gingerbread Spice to use all season and it is divine in this cake. Not too spicy, but just enough to feel it in your throat and that touch of nutmeg and cloves in every bite. You will literally taste each spice as you are eating a slice.
The biggest surprise of all is that this cake is low-fat! My intention was not in any way to create a low-fat cake, it was just by accident, lol. Through my many trials, it was this blend of ingredients that was magic. There are NO nuts, coconut, oil or butter. All the moisture comes from 2 very important ingredients…applesauce and molasses. Without these, your cake will be dry as a bone. They are both magical in flavor and texture. I know some gingerbread cakes have a ton of molasses in them but I’m not a fan. This cake has the perfect amount for me.
HOW DO YOU MAKE VEGAN GINGERBREAD CAKE?
First, you need to gather the gingerbread cake ingredients::
- spelt flour
- brown rice flour
- cornstarch
- baking soda
- Gingerbread spice blend (see below)
- pure maple syrup
- molasses
- unsweetened applesauce
Preheat the oven to 350°F and line an 8×8 square pan (I used almuminum) with parchment paper strips going in each direction,
To a large bowl, add the spelt, rice flour, cornstarch, baking soda, spices and salt and whisk very well.
To the same bowl, add the syrup, applesauce, molasses and hot water. Whisk gently in large circles until everything is combined and smooth, making sure to get the flour at the bottom, but DO NOT over-mix.
Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth out the top and evenly to the corners. Bake on the middle rack for 25 minutes or when a toothpick is completely clean.
Cool the cake completely in the pan before slicing.
This cake is dedicated to my friend Natalie over at Feasting on Fruit because she really loves *moist* cakes! 😉
Vegan Gingerbread Cake
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups (192g) spelt flour (*SEE NOTES AT VERY BOTTOM FOR SUBS!*)
- 1/4 cup (40g) brown rice flour
- 2 tablespoons (16g) cornstarch
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 4 teaspoons gingerbread spice (SEE NOTES AT BOTTOM)
- 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
- 3/4 cup (240g) pure maple syrup, room temp
- 1 cup (240g) unsweetened applesauce, room temp
- 1/4 cup (80g) unsulphured molasses (do not use blackstrap or sub!)
- 2 tablespoons (30g) HOT water
NOTE
- You will need a whisk for this cake to ensure a perfectly smooth batter. A spoon will not incorporate the batter well and will affect the texture. Please know that this cake I tested around 10 times to get it just right, so I cannot stress enough the importance of following the recipe and weighing your ingredients for accuracy. I cannot vouch for results if you sub flours or liquids. The molasses and applesauce are magical for flavor and moisture here and cannot be subbed or the cake will not be moist.
- I use this scale.
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (177°C) and line an 8x8 square pan (I used almuminum) with parchment paper strips going in each direction, cut to fit and with overhang (not bunched in the corners). If you want to make muffins, use 14 parchment liners.
- To a large bowl, add the spelt, rice flour, cornstarch, baking soda, spices and salt and whisk very well.
- Make sure none of your liquids are cold before proceeding, otherwise your batter will not be smooth or mix well. To the same bowl, add the syrup, applesauce, molasses and hot water. Whisk gently in large circles until everything is combined and smooth, making sure to get the flour at the bottom, but DO NOT over-mix. As soon as it's smooth, stop mixing. Over-mixing the batter can make the cake dense and the center SINK. Now, taste that batter and tell me it's not out of this world!
- Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth out the top and evenly to the corners. Bake on the middle rack for 25 minutes or when a toothpick is completely clean. Each trial mine was exactly perfect at 25 minutes on the dot. If making muffins, divide the batter between 14 liners, this will yield the perfect size. Bake the muffins closer to 20-22 minutes, being careful not to over-bake.
- Cool the cake completely in the pan for a minimum of 1 hour, no exception. This allows the cake to completely cook through. There is a lot of applesauce and moisture in this cake, so you don't want to cut too soon or it will be wet. Once ready to serve, lift the cake out with the parchment flaps. Use a very sharp knife to cut carefully into slices. Sprinkle with powdered sugar right before serving. The cake is so moist that you don't want to do the sugar until right before serving or else it just melts into the cake.
Recipe Notes
- I recommend making my Homemade Gingerbread Spice Mix for this cake since I tailor made it for it. You can also keep the blend on hand for making this cake often, pancakes, waffles, muffins, etc. Or you can use a store-bought blend, just make sure it is one containing cloves!
- If you don't want to make my whole blend, then for this recipe, you can just add 1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger, 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon, 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves (use 1/4 tsp for a milder flavor), 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg and 1/2 teaspoon ground allspice.
- To make this with regular white all-purpose flour, sub the spelt and brown rice flours with 1 3/4 cup white all-purpose flour and weigh if possible for best results. You will need 224 grams of the all-purpose flour. Please note that the texture will slightly be more chewy (less soft/tender) because of the higher gluten content than spelt and brown rice flours, but will still be a delicious cake. Be careful to not over-mix the batter. You will reduce the cornstarch to 1 tablespoon (this is your egg). The spelt/rice flour really is the most perfect texture, so getting that would be ideal but the white flour does work well.
- GLUTEN-FREE: To make this gluten-free, sub the spelt flour for superfine GF oat flour (I tested with Bob's Red Mill) and it will be the same weight amount (192g). DO NOT USE a store-bought all-purpose GF blend in place of this oat flour version, that was not tested, ONLY oat flour was and it keeps this recipe moist and very similar to the spelt version. All blends perform very differently. Since oat flour cakes tend to be more dense, you will decrease the applesauce by 2 tablespoons. All the rest of the ingredients remain the same. Please note that the oat flour version is not as light/fluffy and is more dense, so is ONLY recommended if gluten-free is required. It is still delicious, just not as perfect of a texture as the spelt version.
HOLY SHIT! BEST THING I EVER MADE! SO FLUFFY <33333
Hahahaha best review ever!!
This cake is amazing! I made it exactly as written, and used your homemade spice blend. I left out the confectioner’s sugar, it was plenty sweet without it. I took it to work so I wouldn’t devour the whole thing myself, and I had several people ask for the recipe. Thank you so much, deliciousness in its purest form.
Yay, so very happy to hear how much you and everybody at your work enjoyed the cake, thank you Sandy!
Hello! Thank you for the recipe!
Do you think I can substitute the cornstarch for other egg replacer such as 1tbsp of flaxseed and 3tbsp of water? Or that wouldn’t really work?
Hi! I wouldn’t no. The cornstarch helps to make the cake fluffy, whereas flaxseed will give a more gummy dense result.
Could I replace the brown rice flour with chickpea flour? The general rule to replace wheat flour is 3/ c chickpea to each cup of wheat flour. What do you think?
Should say 3/4 cup chickpea flour
I don’t think Chickpea flour would work good here. From my understanding, Chickpea flour is much more binding. Brown rice flour makes things tender. But I can never say if something will work out other than the listed ingredients, because I’ve not tested it and never used chickpea flour. It’s so different in taste and texture, so I’m not sure.
Can you replace cornstarch with arrowroot flour?
Hi Amy, no cornstarch is best here. Arrowroot tends to make things too tough/gooey.
Hi Brandi,
This recipe looks amazing! I have brown rice flour, but no spelt flour. Do you think whole wheat pastry flour would work in place of the spelt?
Thank you for all the hard work that goes into developing your recipes. They are so well thought out and always delicious! 😁
Hi Jess, thank you so much for your kind words!! That means a lot to hear. I’m so sorry, but I don’t think pastry flour work be good here. The reason is, it is a low-fat cake and spelt flour works better here with low-fat, as it provides a more moist crumb, as well as making it more tender. It has less gluten than pastry flour and low-fat baked goods need to be more tender, since they can be on the chewy side. If it was high fat, it would be more easy to swap, but not so much here.
Hi again! How would using a glass pan affect the bake time on this? Thanks for all your help! 🙂
Hi Jess, I’ve never tried it, but I would shoot for the same time and just check for a clean toothpick as listed. Hopefully the edges will not brown too much in a glass pan.
Can I use Bob Red Mill all purpose gf flour (red label)? If so, how much do I use and do I keep the cornstarch amount the same?
Hi Kristina, I really cannot say if that flour would work or not since I’ve not tested it. I do know that personally commercial gluten-free blends do not yield as great of results as my own flours, since my recipes are so specific and tailored to work perfectly together. I did list a gluten-free option in the notes though that was tested. You can always try that blend, but my guess is it might make it more chewy, since I believe his flour blend has gums added.
How many servings per cake, please. .. not listed
Hi Dorothy! Actually, yes it is listed on the recipe card. Next to “servings”.
Love a gingerbread cake! Going to try this tonight, double up the recipe and use a 9″ springform and some muffins for any leftover batter, because you can never have too much! Wonder if it would work well in a bundt cake pan?
Hi Chris! If you double it, that will be a lot of batter for a 9 inch pan, not too sure how it will bake up but you can always try! My concern would be if the sides end up done really early before the middle and they end up chewy. Because it will take so much longer to cook in that smaller deeper of a pan. Never tried it in a bundt pan, so not sure, as bundt cakes can be very finicky and are best to follow recipes that are always written for a bundt cake. But again, I’m not sure since I always bake it in the square wide dish.
I used a bundt cake and it didn’t work. It still tastes amazing. Next time I’ll use a regular pan
I made this for a very omnivorous potluck holiday event last night and everyone LOVED IT. I shared this recipe link with at least 3 people! I will be making this again for my birthday treat next week, in cupcake form, probably with a vegan cream cheese frosting. THANK YOU!!!!
Yay, what an awesome feedback from them! SO happy it was such a hit, thank you for the lovely review Christina!
Just took this out of the oven. It looks so moist and beautiful. Stay tuned for the report on taste 😂
Tastes AHMAZING!
Yay Sherri!!
Can this be frozen … want to make for Xmas . Do you have a vegan lemon sauce recipie I could put on top of servings
I’ve never tried freezing it so I’m not sure. It’s an incredibly fast cake to make though, so you can always make it early that day or the day before, covered well. I have 2 icings your could try. This cream cheese glaze https://thevegan8.com/vegan-cinnamon-rolls-with-cream-cheese-icing/ OR this lemon glaze! https://thevegan8.com/vegan-lemon-cake
Best way to store leftovers??
Room temp covered with foil.
For those out there wanting another GF option, I made this cake with premium gold all purpose gluten free flour instead of the spelt flour. I also only added 1/2 cup of maple syrup and I baked in a buttered, ten inch cast iron skillet with no parchment. I thought the results were excellent…not as tall or likely as fluffy as original, but everyone loved it and thought it was plenty sweet. It also came out of the skillet easily (but a well cured cast iron one). I will make this again over the holidays…as I wanted to have some for breakfast with vegan mexican hot chocolate and it was all gone by the next morning!
SO glad you loved the cake with your changes!
I have made this a few times now and it is always a winner!!
Hi there! Can this be made a day ahead and if so, how do you store it?
Yes! Just keep it stored at room temperature in the baking dish and cover it tightly with foil.
Yay! Thank goodness! You just saved me so much time and work😊 thank you! Merry Christmas!
this recipe looks amazing wow! is it possible to replace the maple syrup with date paste? thanks!
Thank you Sofia! No, I wouldn’t really recommend it. Date paste is much thicker and dense, whereas maple syrup is liquid and flowy. I’m afraid the cake would be really dense/maybe mushy with date paste.
Im really keen to try this recipe…I don’t think anyome has asked this yet…I have spelt flour (my preference in any case) however I don’t use brown rice flour. How do you think coconut flour would work here? I understand it isn’t a dense flour so I’m thinking it may result in being light? I’m fine with gluten.
As for the moloases, what’s your thoughts on using pomegranate molasses or perhaps dates (although the dates might make it chewey)?
Thanks in advance!
Hi Sharan! No, definitely don’t use coconut flour. Coconut flour is unlike any other flour out there. It’s about 5 times as absorbent and makes things very dry and crumbly. I would not ever sub coconut flour in a recipe and only use it where it’s already called for. The brown rice flour works really well for the texture here and is why I use it, as opposed to using all spelt. You can try using all spelt if you like, but just know it will likely be slightly more dense. I’d use 5 tbsp spelt flour (40g) in place of the rice flour instead of 4. Hopefully that will work. For the molasses, I really would get the molasses called for. You can find it at many grocery stores, including walmart and target and is very key to the flavor and texture, as well as moisture. Changing the flour and also the molasses, you would end up with a different cake and I can’t say what would work well since I use what will yield the best results. You are right that dates will make it chewy and dense and I’ve never used pomegranate molasses is, but my guess is the flavor would be too strong.
Hi Brandi,
Thank you for a prompt detailed response!
I’m actually based in the UK but our health stores here should stock those ingredients.
I’m getting back into baking since changing to a plant based diet (it’s been almost 5years since I’ve had cake!) but I want to prove the occasional treat can be earned, especially when baked using whole and stimulating ingredients…its a winner in my book. Never a cheat…only a treat! 🙂
I’ll be sure to post an update of my results.
Enjoy the festive period – thanks again
Sharan
Is it okay to double this recipe (as long as measurements are done very carefully) I would be baking in two 8 by 8 pans instead of trying to adjust baking times in a different size pan.
Yes, definitely! 🙂
Just took it out the oven. Very impressed with the results! Thank you for being so inspirational, it’s my 2nd Vegan bake.
Absolutely delicious! Thank you! I added candied ginger, so good!
Great idea! Sounds delicious!
SO. I made this recipe somewhat in a rush; I switched the flour to white, forgot to leave out a Tb of cornstarch, and realized I only had blackstrap a little too late. I chalked it up to an “experiment cake” and baked as instructed. It still turned out FANTASTIC. Thank you so much for all of your hard work in developing and testing these recipes- every one I make, mistakes and all, always ends up a winner. I really appreciate you!
So very happy you loved it! That is great to hear, thank you Ashley! And thank you so much for your kind words!
Made this cake two times for my family and we all over it so much!! Such a nice, warm and comforting flavor. Did you use a standard oven or a commercial/professional grade oven because each time my cake was not nearly done after 25mins it was still very wet and gooey in the middle. I think it needed 10-15 more minutes, just curious. Thanks!
So happy you all loved the cake Kari! Yes, regular oven! I’ve baked this in 3 different ovens as well, since I’ve moved twice since I first wrote the recipe and each time, it’s perfect at 25 minutes! That is very odd, maybe your oven temp is off or did you change an ingredient??
No I didn’t change any ingredient, maybe just my oven I guess. Either way, it’s still delicious, just have to cook it a little longer. Thanks so much Brandi!!
Woah, wasn’t sure how this would taste without granulated sugar/brown sugar, but the sweetness is just right! I love blackstrap molasses and used it in my cake, so I think it tastes great. Thanks for the cool recipe 😁
Wonderful Lexi, so happy you loved it!
I’m so glad you mentioned using blackstrap molasses successfully because it is all I have on hand. Thanks!