4 Experiments with Veganizing Boxed Cake Mixes

Here are three of the four cakes. The 4th cake is IN the trash. It was awful. Read the post to see which one was the worst tasting experiment.

Have you cooked a vegan cake before? If not, is it because it seems too difficult? Or that you need too many ingredients you are not familiar with?

Gillian and I are part of a group that bakes birthday cakes for at risk and foster kiddos. Our demographic is asked to provide a lot of vegan cakes. So we decided to see how to veganize boxed cake mixes with only one “alternative” ingredient per recipe.

We experimented with two boxed cake mixes (a chocolate and a vanilla). In the end, would the changes we made add up to a tasty cake?

This brand is sold at Bel Air. It might be sold other places, too. It was on sale for about $5 a box.

First, we divided each box mix into halves. That way we could run two experiments on each box mix.

VANILLA CAKE MIX. It requires egg, butter, and milk. We made the following changes.

Experiment 1 – Use half box of vanilla cake dry mix

• Egg – replaced by ¼ cup of applesauce
• Butter – replaced by 2 Tbsp Melt (a vegan butter substitute)
• Milk – replaced by ¼ cup almond milk
• Added ¼ tsp baking powder
• Put clip on this pan so we knew which recipe is which

Experiment 2 – Use half box of vanilla cake dry mix

• Egg – replaced by ¼ cup of applesauce
• Butter – replaced by 2 Tbsp oil
• Milk – replaced by ¼ cup almond milk

We put each of these into a parchment-lined, 8-inch pan. Be sure to use vegan spread or vegan baking spray to coat the pans. We cooked the cakes for about 25 minutes.

Taste Results. Neither cake was exceptionally good nor did they rise. They were dense, sticky and overly sweet.

However, the one made with the oil (instead of Melt) was noticeably better tasting, although still not great. It appears the baking powder did not make a difference as both rose the same. Gillian and I decided we would not make either cake again. We considered both tweeks to be a FAIL.

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CHOCOLATE CAKE MIX. It requires egg, oil, and water. We made the following changes.

Experiment 3 – half box of chocolate cake dry mix

• Egg – replaced by ½ cup of applesauce
• Oil – stayed with 1/3 cup oil
• Water – stayed with 1/3 cup lukewarm water
• Added ¼ tsp baking powder
• Put clip on this pan so we knew which recipe is which.

Experiment 4 – half box of chocolate cake dry mix

• Egg – replaced by ½ cup of applesauce
• Oil – stayed with 1/3 cup oil
• Water – replaced by 1/3 Cup almond milk

We put each of these into a parchment-lined, 8-inch pan. Be sure to use vegan spread or vegan baking spray to coat the pans.. We cooked the cakes for about 25 minutes.

Taste Results. Both cakes rose well, were moist, had a good crumb, and were tasty. We would make either one again. It appears the baking powder did not make a difference as both rose the same.

ADDITIONAL NOTES

We used unsweetened applesauce. The cake didn’t take on the flavour of the apples.

Replacing eggs. Sources say to use ¼ cup of applesauce for each egg. So we made a “mistake” by doubling the amount for the chocolate cake recipes. However, the end result was a tasty cake. Perhaps the vanilla cake would have turned out better had we used 1/2 cup for each experiment.

Applesauce tip. We don’t normally eat applesauce in our home. So I bought a four pack of individuals serving applesauce. Each individual serving is ½ cup. It is easy to keep this on hand to make up a vegan cake.

Baking powder. Sources say to add 1/4 tsp for each one egg replacement. We won’t do this again as it didn’t seem to make any difference at all in how the cakes rose.

Cake mix brand. We used an organic cake mix called Organics. If you do these same experiments with a different brand, let us know your results.

8″ versus 9″ rounds. Each box mix made up two 8” round cakes. If you want to make 9” round cakes, we suggest you use two boxes. One box per pan.

You got this. The next time you have to make a vegan cake, grab a box of chocolate Organics cake mix, oil and some applesauce. If you don’t have a dairy-free milk, use water. It won’t affect the taste.

Your Turn . . . Try this experiment and report back. . . . What additional tips do you have to veganize a boxed cake mix?

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• Kindness is Baking a Birthday Cake for Someone You Don’t Know