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I attempted to make a vegan pineapple upside-down cake this morning, and while it tastes okay, the cake never rose and it's more like a vegan pineapple upside-down pancake.
I used fresh, sliced pineapple, the brown sugar which is low cal in that it's part brown sugar, part Splenda. The topping was fine, I think: besides the pineapple rings, I used dried cherries, a few walnuts and a few halfed dates. But the cake part is the problem, given that it didn't rise. I used 1 cup of whole wheat flour, the specified amount of salt (I used Kosher salt, which was all I have since I normally don't use salt in anything) and the specified amount of baking power. There was no juice from the fresh pineapple, so I subsstituted 6 T of coconut milk. In the cake, instead of sugar, I used that Truvia product which is sold specifically for baking (just found it on the shelves yesterday), using their amount suggestions. Instead of two eggs I used two T of ground flaxseed in water, which had be cooling in the fridge for a couple of hours.
Given that the topping tastes good, I just wonder if I should have used Agave nector in the cake part instead of the Truvia..?
Here's my take on it. It's much harder to alter baking recipes than any other kind because baking is all about chemistry, and its a fine balance. Leave one thing out, change one little thing and the results can change in a big way. Change almost all the ingredients at the same time, as you did, and it's hard to sort out what went wrong.
I don't know if it would work for you to go to white flour instead of whole-wheat, but that's what I would try first, since it is the largest single ingredient. It's tricky to get whole-wheat to work for a risen cake, which after all is the reason why white flour became the standard for cake baking hundreds of years ago. The batter is much more elastic, allowing the gas bubbles to rise and bring the cake up with it. Whole-wheat batter is inherently heavier and harder to rise.
And not to overlook another possible culprit, is your baking powder fresh?
My baking power is fresh, but I think I made too many changes for the recipe to work. If anyone has a better recipe, please share it? (But don't just google it and give me the link? I can do that; I'd much rather hear from someone who has made this cake, themselves.)
If is very difficult to get a decent rise for a cake out of 100% whole wheat flour. I would use no more than 1/3 whole wheat flour and the rest white flour and bump up the amount of baking powder a bit.
I never use white flour, ever. But in baking I use whole wheat pastry flour and it works great. If you used regular whole wheat flour I would try the whole wheat pastry next time and see if that will help. Trader Joes sells it in big bags or any health food store will carry it.
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I never use white flour, ever. But in baking I use whole wheat pastry flour and it works great. If you used regular whole wheat flour I would try the whole wheat pastry next time and see if that will help. Trader Joes sells it in big bags or any health food store will carry it.
Whole-Wheat pastry flour is also called Graham Flour.
Something that is not obvious to everyone is that what makes a whole-wheat flour whole-wheat is that the oil- containing germ and the bran are not removed, but are ground up very fine. The wheat-germ oil goes rancid quickly, so authentic whole-wheat flour has a short shelf life compared to white flour, which can be extended by wrapping the flour tightly and placing in the freezer.
Wheat flour is hard to make a cake with because if you overmix it even a little, it turns into spackle and won't rise no matter how you beg.
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