Vegan pumpkin spice latte sheet cake has all the flavors of creamy pumpkin spice latte with an extra ginger kick. This cake is a fall delight in every way: the spices, cozy texture and pumpkin flavored creaminess. If you love pumpkin spice and ginger, I’m sure you’ll love this cake!
Fresh Ginger Cake
The original recipe of the cake is from Food52 Genius Recipes cookbook full of wonderful classics with a twist.
This cake is called Fresh Ginger Cake and it was created by cookbook author Sylvia Thompson.
What caught my eye in this recipe is the use of fresh ginger. And not just a little but the size of an egg! I wasn’t brave enough to try the cake with this much ginger, and I also tweaked the recipe in other ways to make it more suitable to my pumpkin spice latte theme.
Adjustments to the original recipe
This recipe was super easy to make vegan: I used dairy-free butter instead of butter and I just dropped 1 egg from the recipe.
I didn’t have the same syrups the recipe called for so I just used maple syrup.
I didn’t use molasses, but I added strong coffee (espresso) to the cake to enhance the intense flavors.
Quatre épices and pumpkin spice mix
One important part of the original cake is Quatre épices spice mix. This spice mix gives the cakes it’s spicy kick together with the fresh ginger.
Quatre épices consists of four spices (all ground):
- white pepper
- ginger
- nutmeg
- cloves
From this spice mix I actually got the idea to turn this cake into a vegan pumpkin spice latte sheet cake because the spices are so similar!
Pumpkin spice mix usually consists of (all ground):
- cinnamon
- ginger
- nutmeg
- cloves
So here’s what I did to combine these two:
I used cinnamon in both the cake and the frosting recipe. I used white pepper as a kick in the cake recipe. And then I used pumpkin spice mix in the frosting recipe.
Pumpkin spice latte
I think I did a pretty good job making the cakes flavor profile match pumpkin spice latte:
- Cake layer: ginger spiced coffee cake.
- Pumpkin spice layer: creamy pumpkin cream spiced with pumpkin spice mix.
- Creamy decoration layer: vegan whipped cream piped on top.
Enjoy these amazing spicy fall flavors ♥
If you’re searching for other pumpkin recipes, here are some popular ones from the blog:
Pumpkin tiramisu overnight oats
Vegan pumpkin spice latte sheet cake
Equipment
- brownie pan or similar ~28 x 18 cm or ~11 x 7 inches
Ingredients
Fresh ginger cake
- 1/2 cup / ~100 g vegan butter
- 1/2 cup / 120 ml cool water
- 1/2 cup / 100 g firmly packed light brown sugar
- 1/4 cup / 60 ml maple syrup The original recipe: light molasses
- 1/4 cup / 60 ml strong coffee The original recipe: dark corn syrup
- ~2 tbsp add more if you like fresh grated ginger The original recipe: fresh ginger the size of an egg, grated medium-fine
- 1 1/2 cups / 180 g all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 2 tsp cinnamon
- 1/4 tsp ground cloves
- 1/8 tsp ground white pepper
Pumpkin spice whipped cream
- 2 cups whipped plant-based cream I use Kaslink AITO Oat for whipping
- 1/2 cup / ~120 g pumpkin puree
- 3 tbsp maple syrup Adjust sweetness level if needed (depends on the sweetness of the cream)
- 2 tsp cinnamon
- 1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
- 1/4 tsp ground ginger
- 1/4 tsp ground cloves
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 175 C / 350 F. Line a baking pan with parchment paper, bottom and sides.
- Melt butter in the water over medium heat. Don't let the water boil.
- Whisk sugar, syrup and ginger to the butter-water mixture.
- Add flour, baking soda, salt and spices.
- Whisk until all lumps dissolve.
- Pour into the baking pan and bake for about 25 minutes. Ovens (and pan sizes) are very different, so test with a toothpick. The cake should be firm when ready and the toothpick should come out clean.
- Let cake cool.
- Set aside about 1/2 cup whipped cream.
- Whip together rest of the cream and other pumpkin spice cream ingredients.
- Spread pumpkin cream layer on top of cake and decorate with the rest of the cream.
- This cake keeps well covered in the fridge for about 4 days.
The Third Forest Brunch
I made this cake for our Sunday Forest brunch yesterday. I actually baked the cake already on Saturday, because I wanted the flavor to be more intense for Sunday. And it was simply perfect!
This cake reminds me of one of our all-time favorite cakes, a traditional Finnish bundt cake called Piimäkakku (buttermilk cake). It’s a spice cake very similar to gingerbread cake which my grandma used to bake when I was little.
So I definitely have a thing for spicy soft cakes and it’s no wonder my children really enjoy them too!
I’ll write more about our third forest brunch next Sunday 🙂
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