Copycat ring ding cakes or ding dongs are made healthier than the store-bought treat of round, cream-filled chocolate hand cakes. My homemade version is a healthier chocolate cake filled with a nutritious coconut cream and dipped in a healthy dark chocolate.
Put coconut milk can to chill overnight so the solid portion will separate from the liquid. You want to use the solid portion for the whipped cream.
1 13.6oz/403ml coconut milk (full fat)
Ready to bake? Preheat oven to 350 degrees F
Grease an 8-inch square pan with vegan butter, and dust with cacao powder or line both ways with parchment paper
In a large mixing bowl, combine milk and lemon juice and set aside for 10 minutes.
Make Cake
In the large bowl, add to the milk/lemon mixture you prepared during prep all the other wet ingredients. Stir.
1 cup dairy free milk, 1 tablespoon lemon juice, ½ cup pumpkin puree, 2 teaspoon vanilla
Then dump in all the dry ingredient. Mix into a batter, but not long, you don't want a rubbery cake and over-mixing all purpose flour mixtures will do that.
1 ½ cups all purpose flour or GF baking flour, ½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder, 1 cup organic cane sugar, 2 teaspoon baking soda, 1 teaspoon baking powder, ½ teaspoon salt, 1 tablespoon instant coffee granules or brewed coffee
Pour batter into the pan, tap to even the surface, and bake 35 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
To flatten the center dome and make it easier to cut hockey pucks, press gently on the hot cake with a spatula all around the surface.
Let cool in the pan for 30 minutes, run knife around inside edge, place a rectangular cook rack on top of cake, and tip pan upside down and allow cake to come out of pan and sit on rack.
Place cake on rack in refrigerator for about an hour to allow it to cool and harden a bit before attempting to cut the cake circles.
Cut circles using a circle cookie cutter. I have made these using 2-inch cookie cutters, and 3 inch cookie cutters. As you might guess, the 3-inch circles accept more cream.
The left over cake cuttings can be crumbled on to a cookie sheet, toasted for 10 minutes at 350F. Don't burn them! Then use the crumbles as dessert sprinkles on ice cream or smoothie bowls.
Make the Cream
To make the coconut cream, open the chilled coconut milk can, and scoop out the solid coconut - there will be ⅔ cup of liquid left behind, save that refrigerated for future smoothies.
1 13.6oz/403ml coconut milk (full fat)
In the medium bowl, blend this solid coconut with the powdered sugar and vanilla and cream of tarter with a hand-mixer until creamy. Set in refrigerator to chill for the time left that the cake has to chill.
½ cup organic powdered sugar, 1 teaspoon vanilla, ½ teaspoon cream of tarter, pinch of salt, 1 13.6oz/403ml coconut milk (full fat)
Pipe in Cream Filling
When both cake and cream are chilled, insert cream into circles using this technique:Insert a baking tip into a frosting bag, fill the bag with the cream, and pipe the cream gentle into the side. You can also pipe into the top just be sure you can smooth down the top for coating.
Make the Chocolate Coating
Melt the chocolate and coconut oil in a shallow bowl in the microwave at 60 seconds. Stir until all is melted.
2 cups dark chocolate chips, 2 tablespoon coconut oil
Dip each cake in the chocolate coating bowl using two forks and use a spoon to add mixture all around the cake.
Set each coated cake back on the cooling rack and set them in the freezer for a few minutes to set, or leave them at room temperature.Once set, they are ready to eat! Enjoy!
Storage
Keep them in a sealed container and refrigerated for 2 days. Or freeze them for 3 months.
Notes
1. Chilling the cooled 8-inch square cake in the refrigerator before cutting circles may help you cut cleaner circles. 2. Freeze the leftover cake crumbs for other uses, such as to press into the batter of my Swiss Cake Roll (Easy Trick to Roll), or sprinkle on magic shell toppings on ice cream or into homemade ice cream, or into homemade cookie dough.