Vegan Battenberg (Mattenberg)

Name: Vegan Battenberg (Mattenberg)
Total time: 18000 s
Yield: 8-10 slices
Cuisine: British
Ingredients: 320 g Self Raising Flower; 80 g Ground Almonds; 240 g Caster Sugar; 2 tsp Baking Powder; 400 ml Soya Milk (or Nut based alternative); 160 ml Oil (Sunflower or Rapeseed); 1 Tbsp Vanilla Paste; 2 tsp Almond Extract; Vegan food colouring paste; 450 g Marzipan (Store bought is usually vegan friendly); Fruit Jam (Apricot or other seedless jam); Icing sugar (to help roll out the marzipan); Boiling water (to help thin out the jam)

cranialscratch @cook_13290347

North Cadbury, Somerset

This is a recipe I have perfected over every bake. I absolutely adore Battenberg cake, but try to find a vegan version. It simply does not exist. Even trying to make Battenberg with egg and milk is hard to get right. But now, you can make a vegan Battenberg (Mattenberg) cake, and return to almond cake heaven!

TIP: Try to do the mixing of the wet and dry at the very last moment - prepare everything else in advance so that you can be quick. You want the reaction of the baking powder (to form bubbles in the mix) to happen inside the oven, not whilst it is sat on the counter. This is key to baking vegan cakes.

Whilst I haven't tried this myself - you could separate the dry ingredients into two bowls, mixing in half of the wet mix into one bowl, and then adding the colouring paste to the remainder of the wet mix before adding to the second bowl of dry ingredients.

cranialscratch @cook_13290347

North Cadbury, Somerset

Saved

Ingredients

1.5 hours

8-10 slices

320 gSelf Raising Flower
80 gGround Almonds
240 gCaster Sugar
2 tspBaking Powder
400 mlSoya Milk (or Nut based alternative)
160 mlOil (Sunflower or Rapeseed)
1 TbspVanilla Paste
2 tspAlmond Extract
Vegan food colouring paste
450 gMarzipan (Store bought is usually vegan friendly)
Fruit Jam (Apricot or other seedless jam)
Icing sugar (to help roll out the marzipan)
Boiling water (to help thin out the jam)

Saved

Steps

1.5 hours

1

Preheat oven to 180℃
2

Line 2x loaf pans with baking parchment - use a little dairy-free vegetable spread to keep the parchment in place.
3

Mix together dry ingredients in a large bowl:
- Self Raising Flour
- Ground Almonds
- Caster Sugar
- Baking Powder
4

Mix together wet ingredients in a separate bowl (ideally in a large jug):
- Soya / Nut Milk
- Oil
- Vanilla Paste
- Almond Extract
5

Pour the wet ingredients into the dry mix and stir by hand. Stir until just mixed.
TIP: It's OK for it to be lumpy - the lumps will bake out, and actually helps with making vegan cakes rise as the baking powder takes longer to react.
6

Bang out the air bubbles - drop the bowl onto a wooden chopping board a few times.
TIP: You want the baking powder to react only when it is in the oven - not before. The bubbles aerate the mix too soon.
7

Pour half of the mix into one loaf pan (about 550g).
8

Add a small amount of food colouring paste to the left over mix and stir in. Keep banging out air bubbles as you do this. Be careful not to over-mix, but get the colour to be consistent.
9

Pour the remaining cake mix into the other loaf pan.
10

Bang out the bubbles in both loaf pans and place in the oven - on the middle shelf.
11

Bake for at least 45-minutes.
TIP: Check with a toothpick that the cake has completely baked. You don't want the toothpick coming out with any mix stuck to it. There is a balance between under-baked and over-baked, and it appears to be a matter of a minute or two. As the cake has completed rising, checking every few minutes is OK and won't effect the cake.
NOTE: The coloured cake can take a couple of minutes longer. This may be down to it being more mixed than the uncoloured bake.
12

Cool in the tin for 10-minutes before turning out on to a wire rack and allowing it to completely cool.
13

Sprinkle icing sugar on to a dry flat surface and roll out a thin sheet of marzipan.
TIP: You need your marzipan to be four and a bit times longer than the width of the cake, and as long as the cake - when cut to shape.
14

Cut the cakes into shape:
TIP: Trim the tops off the cake so that they are flat. Then stack the one cake on top of the other and trim the sides. Once you have a long square shape, cut the whole cake down the middle to create 4x long bars of cake.
15

Add the tiniest dribble of boiling hot water to the jam and mix to a thickish paint consistency.
TIP: Too thin and an already moist cake soaks up all the jam. Too thick and it is hard to paint onto the cake surface.
16

Paint on just enough jam to stick all 4x bars of cake into the traditional Battenberg checkerboard pattern. Leave the outside exposed edge jam free.
17

Paint on a thin layer of jam onto the rolled out marzipan.
18

Place the checkerboard cake bar to the the one side of the marzipan, allowing for a small lip of marzipan to be exposed (one or two centimetres / an inch).
19

Cut the edge of the marzipan lip so that it is straight - following along the line of the cake - yet still leaving a lip.
20

Carefully roll the cake bar along the jam covered marzipan, flattening down the marzipan so that it is well adhered to the cake.
21

When the cake is fully covered, trim the end of the marzipan along the line of the cake, and fold over the small lip.
22

Trim the ends of the cake to give the marzipan and cake a clean finish.
23

Voila! Now if you're not to sickly sweet from eating all the off-cuts of marzipan and cake, cut yourself a slice and serve. YUM!
Tip: Store in a cool open container. There is a lot of moisture in a homemade Battenberg and it can "sweat" and go mushy if you put it in an airtight container or anywhere too warm.
The cake generally lasts a long time - but I've never been able to keep one for longer than a week as I've already eaten it all.
24

TIP: This cake is great on its own - without the marzipan, and works for cupcakes or layer cakes. You can swap out the almond essence for any flavour, and swap out the ground almonds for more flour. Try different colours. Go nuts!
Best wishes
Matt