Vegan Chocolate Cake with Avocado Buttercream

During my middle school days, when everyone was on patrol to pinch you if you weren’t wearing green for St. Patrick’s, it was the cool thing to say you were wearing green underwear. This statement was just risqué enough to suffice the pinchers and left you pinch-free. Where do kids come up with this stuff?

Instead of the green underwear, I think a green cake is so much cooler. Green frosting isn’t a novelty, but this recipe is kind of exciting by how it’s green! Last year I made these mint brownies with an avocado filling. It worked very well and I wanted to play around with that recipe. Then I stumbled upon Joy the Baker’s Vegan Chocolate Avocado Cake and voilà – I was in my kitchen making cake and avocado frosting.

Like many of you will be, I was skeptical of a plain avocado frosting. The avocado filling in my mint brownies are loaded with mint flavor, so you don’t taste the avocado – but this frosting is literally just straight avocado! I seriously had to resist putting a splash of lemon, lime and garlic when first blending it up. We all automatically think of guacamole from ripe avocado, but resist! The end product is very intriguing. True, you can taste the avocado in the frosting, but the sweetness and vanilla make it just different enough to be delicious.

Non-vegan Joy loved this cake and that made me excited to make it. The fact that this cake is naturally vegan is just all too good! Sometimes vegan baking is more moist and dense than old-fashioned butter and eggs and this is a great chocolate cake recipe to have on hand. If you are not totally sold on the frosting, try the cake recipe on its own. Sub the avocado frosting for chocolate if that’s more you’re style. It doesn’t have to be green to be delicious and you’ll still be cool because you have cake.

Vegan Chocolate Cake with Avocado Buttercream Frosting
Print Recipe

Vegan Chocolate Cake:
2 1/2 cups Spelt Flour
6 Tablespoons Cocoa Powder
1/2 teaspoon Sea Salt
2 teaspoons Baking Powder
1 1/2 teaspoons Baking Soda
1 3/4 cups Coconut Sugar
1/4 cup Grape seed Oil
1/3 cup Ripe Avocado, well mashed
1 2/3 cups Almond Milk
1 1/2 Tablespoons Apple Cider Vinegar
2 teaspoons Vanilla Extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  Grease and flour two 7 or 8 inch cake rounds.  Set aside.

Mix all the wet ingredients together in a bowl, including the avocado and sugar.
In another bowl, combine all the dry ingredients.  Add the wet to the dry all at once and whisk vigorously until combined.

Pour batter into the prepared pans. Bake for 25-35 minutes, until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Let cakes cool in pan for 15 minutes, then turn out onto cooling racks to cool completely. Trim the tops of the cakes with a serrated knife for smooth tops if needed. Frost with avocado buttercream:

Vegan Avocado Buttercream Frosting
2 very ripe, soft medium Avocados
2 teaspoons Fresh Lemon Juice
3 1/2 cups Powdered Xylitol and/or Erythitol*
1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract

Slice into the avocados and scoop out the green meat. Make sure avocado is totally soft and avoid any brown spots.

Place the avocado into a large bowl.  Add lemon juice to the avocados and beat together on medium speed, until they are smooth, for about 2-3 minutes.

Add the powdered natural sugars and beat well until smooth and fluffy.  Add vanilla extract until combined. You can tweak this frosting according to tastes, so feel free to up the vanilla or sweeteners until you reach a flavor you like.

PS – If you encounter any naysayers on this frosting, add 1/2-1 teaspoon of mint extract and you’ll have a delicious frosting very similar to my mint filling here. Chocolate and mint is always a win!

*You will see a few brown specs in my pictures because I tried adding 1/4 cup of date sugar. I thought it added a great flavor but it is visible, so don’t add more than 1/4 cup if you want it to stay bright green..