Vegan, Gluten Free, Chocolate Cake

Both my girls and myself love banana's, we can easily eat about 5 kg a week between us, sometimes even more. But there are times when a few of them over ripen and when that happens what better than to make Vegan chocolate cake.

I also wanted to use the left over pulp from our nut milk. I recently harvested almonds on the land and there is nothing better than fresh almond milk. I like to add hemp seeds as well to bulk up the nutritional value. I do like to make sure, that my girls get all the nutrients they need in morning, that way they are set up for the day and can munch on the fruits and veg that grow on the land when they get hunger between meals.

So I decided to incorporate the pulp with the cake again, increasing the nutritional value of the cake. I don't use sugar than often and if I do, it's coconut sugar, and that is quite expensive around these parts. But with 4 very over ripe banana's to use, who needs sugar.

What you see above is 4 banana's (mashed nicely by my 7 year old daughter) with the left over nut and seed pulp from our morning milk and 3 tablespoons of coconut oil.

I made some buckwheat flour using my blender, (this blender is on it's last legs and I hate to think of life without it, I use it everyday). I used about 300grams.

Then it was time to add the cacao, I just pour some in. We quite chocolate in my home, so I put in a nice amount, I guess you can adjust it to your liking. I reckon it was about 4 tablespoons.

I had already prepared flax egg, by blending up flax seeds and adding them to water. I used 3 tablespoons of milled flax seeds and 9 tablespoons of water, and left it to sit for about 10mins. It is usually the first thing I do, so I really should have put it first, but hey, as long as you remember to do it, it's all good.

Then I added 2 teaspoons of baking power and half a teaspoon of bicarbonate to the flour and cacao mix, along with a nice amount of cinnamon. Cinnamon is a flavour I like so I added for my taste.

A shot of all the ingredients together. I do like to mix all of my dry ingredients and all of my wet separately. I love feeling the texture of both. Baking is so tactile, I love to use my hands when mixing them together, but I do use spatulas etc to transfer them out. I am just doing what makes me happy and I like to add my energy into the bake too.

Then it is time to mix them all up together. I got very involved in this step and then forgot to take any pictures of how good it looks all mixed together. It tasted just as good as it looked. My girls love to clean out the bowl for me, each of them with chocolate covered faces and hands. (Myself included)

I put it in the oven for about 45 mins. I took it out and checked to see that the middle was cooked and it was. My girls could smell it cooking and never wandered far from the truck, popping their heads in regularly to see if it was ready.

We let it cool down and then dug in. I only remembered to take pictures after half of the cake was devoured. I decorated it with pomegranates, because they are abundant right now and go so well with everything. It tasted really good, nice and moist in the middle and very chocolatey . I only remembered that I had some walnuts that I harvested, after I had cooked it, they would have went really well with it. I am feeling blessed to live on land that provides me with so much!

Have a great week everyone and if you do have any food waste,don't forget to get creative, and share it all with us on here!