Several years ago, I co-hosted a recipe contest with ZenSoy, makers of dairy-free organic puddings and milk beverages. One of the winners was this delicious vegan Chocolate Zucchini Cake by an entrant named Maiah.
Leah decided to make this dessert in her kitchen, and took these beautiful photographs to celebrate it. She said:
I whipped up this Chocolate Zucchini Cake yesterday. It is so decadent and delicious! I really love the touch of spices in it. I left it out for my roommates to enjoy and they’ve devoured just about the whole thing. I’m happy to have people to share it with so I don’t devour the whole thing myself!
Leah made a couple of minor modifications to Maiah’s chocolate zucchini cake recipe. I’ve added her changes, but included notes with Maiah’s original ingredients. Whichever version you choose, you’ll be rewarded with a lovely, chocolaty, vegan cake that’s perfect for enjoying a bounty of zucchini.
Special Diet Notes: Chocolate Zucchini Cake
By ingredients, this recipe is dairy-free / non-dairy, egg-free, nut-free, optionally soy-free, vegan, and vegetarian.
- ¼ cup + 2 tablespoons water
- 2 tablespoons ground flaxmeal
- 2½ cups all-purpose flour
- ¼ cup cocoa powder
- 1 teaspoon baking powder*
- ½ teaspoon baking soda*
- ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- ¼ teaspoon ground allspice
- ¼ teaspoon salt**
- 1 cup cane sugar
- ⅔ cup coconut oil***
- ½ cup chocolate dairy-free milk beverage
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 heaping cups grated zucchini
- 1 cup dairy-free mini chocolate chips
- 1 cup organic powdered sugar
- 2 tablespoons cocoa powder
- 1 tablespoon chocolate dairy-free milk beverage, or as needed
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- Preheat your oven to 350ºF and grease a 9X13-inch baking dish.
- Whisk the water and flaxmeal together in a small dish.
- Sift the flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, spices, and salt together into a medium bowl.
- Place the sugar, oil, chocolate milk beverage, flaxmeal-water mixture, and vanilla in a large mixing bowl. Blend with a stand mixer, hand mixer or whisk until combined.
- Stir the dry ingredients and zucchini alternately into the ingredients in your mixing bowl. Fold in the chocolate chips.
- Pour the batter into your prepared baking dish and even out.
- Bake for 35 to 45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean.
- Let cool completely.
- While the cake cools, whisk the sugar, cocoa powder, chocolate milk beverage, and vanilla together in a medium bowl, adding as much milk beverage as needed to get your desired drizzly consistency.
- Drizzle the glaze on the cake slices just before serving.
**Since Maiah used buttery spread and more baking soda in her original recipe, she did not use added salt.
**Maiah's original recipe uses ⅓ cup melted dairy-free buttery spread or margarine + ⅓ cup oil (such as grapeseed, rice bran or vegetable). Leah swapped in coconut oil for both, and it worked well. Choose the option that you prefer! But if using coconut oil, remember that all ingredients must be at room temperature. If not, the coconut oil will solidify. If this happens, just leave the batter at room temperature until the ingredients warm and can be properly stirred together.
8 Comments
This recipe was a disaster for me. Not sure if it was the flaxseed mixture or the coconut oil but the batter was hard and clumpy. I couldn’t “pour” it into a pan because it was too solid. I added enough more nut milk to make it soft enough to put into a pan. I am waiting for the results as it cooks. Was that supposed to happen? There was no mention of how hard and clumpy the dough would be.
Hi Tina, did you use coconut oil and then add any cold ingredients – ie refrigerated zucchini, cold nut milk, etc? Coconut oil has a high melt point, so it sets up firmly at cool temperatures, below 75 degrees. If you are using cold ingredients, you need to bring them to room temperature whenever working with coconut oil. It would have cooked fine (the coconut oil melts very quickly in the oven – once all ingredients are warm), but I can’t say if it will set up since you added more nut milk.
This chocolate cake looks amazingly decadent! I don’t follow a restrictive diet, but always like to have recipes to use for when I have guests that do. This one is a keeper!
That’s great of you to think of others Renee! Although, this recipe was a winner with non-vegans, too 🙂
I can’t wait until my garden zucchini is ready for harvest. This chocolate cake is going on the menu!
Love the addition of all those spices married with chocolate! Sounds absolutely divine and you get extra fibre from the veggies!
Always looking for great recipes to use up that plethora of zucchini in the garden! I bet this could easily be made Gluten-Free using Cup 4 Cup or Bob’s Red Mill Gluten Free 1-to-1 Baking Flour
I think it would! A little tricky on the texture without eggs, too, but chocolate cakes tend to be forgiving.