Vegan Chocolate Pumpkin Cake

This vegan chocolate pumpkin cake is a party in your mouth. The pumpkin flavor is hidden but the moisture it contributes is not. The next time you bake a chocolate cake, add a little pumpkin and you won’t be sorry.

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Chocolate Pumpkin Cake

Chocolate cake is magical, isn’t it? Why not make it more magical by adding a hidden veggie? Here, I decided to add pumpkin to see what it would do for the texture.

As it turns out, pumpkin is a wondrous ingredient to put into chocolate cake. Like beets, it adds incredible moisture and texture. And nutrition.

How is Pumpkin Healthy?

Adding pumpkin to baked goods is nutritionally useful because pumpkin is loaded with vitamins and minerals. And it is really high in the antioxidant beta-carotene.

This antioxidant is one of the plant carotenoids converted to Vitamin A in the body.

Vitamin A is essential for healthy, glowing skin, strong eyesight, and our immune system.

Pumpkin also adds Vitamin A, anti-oxidants, both of which support skin and eyesight, and it is packed with immunity-boosting nutrients.

The nutritional facts are for the cake without frosting.

Here, I frosted the cake with my basic chocolate frosting here. I have a few recipes on my blog, just put “frosting” into my search at the top of the page. If you want to keep the sugar down in your frosting, try my frosting  that has less sugar naturally with the aid of arrowroot.

How to Make This Chocolate Pumpkin Cake?

You make this cake just as you would any cake. The only difference is mix in the pumpkin puree with the wet ingredients. I used a bpa-free organic brand but you can probably use fresh pumpkin if you want to cook it up and puree it.

In this recipe, I added spices that coincide with pumpkin but those are optional if you want to leave them out. A way to deepen the chocolate flavor instead is to add a few tablespoons of cold coffee! You won’t taste the coffee I promise.

Another tip from a blog follower. She made this cake as a bundt cake, with the only difference, baking it for 60 minutes.

Finally, if you want to create thin layers, the way I did, use a cake leveler to divide the two layers in half. For my cake, one half broke up so we ate it and I used only three for this cake!

Do you need a frosting recipe? I used this one for this cake.

I hope you try my recipe. If you do, please comment below on how it turned out.

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Chocolate Pumpkin Cake

This vegan chocolate pumpkin cake is a party in your mouth. The pumpkin flavor is hidden but the moisture it contributes is not. And it is vegan, dairy-free and gluten-free.

5 from 1 vote

Print Rate

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: vegan, dairy-free, gluten-free

Keyword: chocolate cake, chocolate layer cake, chocolate pumpkin cake, hidden veggie dessert

Does it keep?: freezer-friendly

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Cook Time: 35 minutes

Total Time: 55 minutes

Servings: 18

Calories: 161kcal

Author: Dee Dine

Ingredients

Put in Measuring Cup

• 1 cup almond milk
• 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar

Put in Large Bowl

• 1 (15-oz) can pumpkin puree (I used organic bpa-free canned pumpkin)
• 1 1/2 cup organic cane sugar
• 1/2 cup light olive oil
• 2 tbsp cold coffee
• 2 tsp vanilla

Put in Small Bowl

• 1 3/4 cup gluten-free all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup cacao powder
• 1 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder (Be sure to use a brand that is aluminum-free or else your cake could taste like metal)
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tbsp pumpkin pie spice (or just 1/2 tsp each of cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg)
• 1 tsp salt

Useful Equipment

• cake layer leveler

US Customary - Metric

Instructions

Prep

• Preheat oven to 350F.
• Rub butter or coconut oil on inside of 2 (8-inch or 9-inch) cake round pans.
• Dust with cacao powder, shake out the excess and set aside.
• Mix the almond milk and ACV in the measuring cupl, and let set for a few minutes to activate.

Make the Cake

• Mix up wet ingredients in the large bowl first. Stir until combined.
• Mix up the dry ingredients in the small bowl next.
• Alternate adding the ACV mixture from the measuring cup and the dry ingredients from the small bowl into the LARGE bowl with wet ingredients.

  Use a hand mixer and combine between each addition, but only just combine. You don't want to over mix.
• Divide batter evenly between your cake pans.
• Bake 35 minutes, or until a test comes out clean. Cool for 30 minutes before removing from pan.
• To use the leveler, let the layers cool completely, then slip each into two layers using the leveler that I linked to in ingredients. Frost carefully because the layers have crumbly surfaces.

Nutrition

Calories: 161kcal | Carbohydrates: 28g | Protein: 2g | Fat: 7g | Saturated Fat: 1g | Sodium: 240mg | Potassium: 96mg | Fiber: 3g | Sugar: 17g | Vitamin A: 9IU | Vitamin C: 1mg | Calcium: 47mg | Iron: 1mg

Dee Dine

Dee Dine is founder of Green Smoothie Gourmet, a plant based recipe blog, and author of the recent cookbook, Crazy Healthy with 4 Ingredients . On this blog you’ll find incredibly easy recipes with hidden veggies for anyone wanting to eat healthier, regardless of diet. Dee has graduate degrees in sciences and  journalism. More about Dee Dine here.