Vegan Angel Food Cake

I invited a friend over for tea - who happens to be dieting with Weight Watchers and told me she could only have Angel Food Cake...

...I happen to have an Angel Food Cake pan that I've never used - and I've certainly never made an Angel Food cake before...

...A quick search of the web sort of informed me that no other vegans have either - haha - it's something about the main ingredient being 12 (YIKES) egg whites...

...but I am a fearless baker and although my efforts did not quite 'rise to the occasion' (hehe) they were certainly sweet and edible and according to my friend - 'had the right flavour' if not quite the right texture...

Ingredients:
1 1/4 cups sugar - I used organic beet sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup cake flour, sifted with 1 teaspoon of baking powder (the original recipe did not have baking powder - but I figured I needed a little more lift)
12 teaspoons of EnerG Egg Replacer
2 teaspoons Agar powder
2 Tablespoons flax seed goo - just boil a Tablespoon of ground flax seed in about 1/2 cup of water and then strain the slimy stuff through a fine strainer.
20 Tablespoons warm water
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 teaspoons cream of tartar

Directions:
Heat oven to 350 degrees F. Process sugar in food processor for a couple of minutes. Sift half of the sugar with the salt and the cake flour.

Keep the remaining sugar to put in the 'egg' mixture later.

In a large bowl, use a whisk to mix EnerG, water, agar powder, flax goo, vanilla, and cream of tartar. After a couple of minutes, switch to a hand mixer.

Slowly sift in the reserved sugar, beating continuously at medium speed.

Once you have achieved some sort of soft peaks, sift a Tablespoon or so of the flour mixture in to dust the top of the foam. Fold in gently with a spatula. Continue adding flour by tablespoonful until all of the flour mixture is incorporated.

Carefully spoon mixture into an ungreased tube pan. Bake for 35 minutes before checking for doneness with a wooden skewer. (When inserted halfway between the inner and outer wall, the skewer should come out dry).

Cool upside down on cooling rack for at least an hour before removing from pan. Mine came cleanly right out of the pan.


First - process the sugar until pretty fine...

Mix your EnerG egg replacer, Agar powder, and flax goo

That flax goo is really slippery slimy stuff - just like egg whites...

This is what it will look like before you start whisking...

Add in about 1/2 the fine sugar...

sift the rest of the sugar with the flour and salt...

...and sift again...

Start whisking...

After a couple of minutes switch to a hand mixer with a whisk attachment...

Whisk/beat until soft peaks form...


Then sprinkle a Tablespoon or so of the flour/sugar/salt mixture on top of the fluffy 'egg' mixture

Carefully fold in from the sides and bottom - the way Julia would do it...

Do that again and again - it's the most time consuming part...

Sprinkle and fold

- sprinkle and fold...

Then spoon carefully into the ungreased tube pan - you don't want to deflate your lofty batter...

Bake at 350 for 35 - 40 minutes without opening the door - then check for doneness - invert on a cake rack to cool - the original directions said to invert and leave the pan for one hour - but my somewhat shorter cake slipped right out without using a knife to pry loose the sides...

I thought the cake looked perfect and certainly had a nice crispy spongey appearance. It tasted nice - I guess it's the cream of tartar flavour that I'm not used to in a cake (I don't really even remember ever eating Angel Food Cake) - but it was nice and spongey and a little bit chewy - just not quite lofty enough - oh well I'll try again for sure.