My blog is two! Happy blog birthday to meeeeeee!
Time has really flown by and a lot has happened in the last two years. I started the blog as way to cope after being made redundant at the end of a year’s maternity leave with my daughter, when my son was two. I felt rubbish and wanted an outlet for any creativity that had been buried under the newborn haze of sleepless nights, as well as something new to focus on besides work. I had been experimenting with adding vegetables to cakes since my son’s first birthday, so Veggie Desserts was suddenly borne.
Over these two years I’ve learned how to blog, take pictures and develop recipes. The blogging community has been very helpful and supportive. My vegetable cakes slowly became more and more experimental; I started with the now-ubiquitous Chocolate Beetroot Cake and my recipes moved to the definitely more unusual Barbecued Celeriac and Apple Cake with Apple Ice Cream and Salted Bourbon Butterscotch.
I’ve been so pleased with the reaction to my recipes. Often people seem a bit confused at first, but then when they realise that you can’t taste the vegetables (I trial them until they work without any veg taste), they’re usually game to try more.
I’ve been honoured to have been Jamie Oliver’s Food Blog of the Month, won Best Food Blog at the UK National Blog Awards 2014, one of The Guardian’s Sustainable Bloggers, nominated and shortlisted for a load of other awards, and I was chosen as one of Top Sante Magazine’s Best Bloggers of 2014.
My blog’s original premise, vegetables in desserts, is very niche, so the sheer volume of international press it has garnered has seriously floored me. A three page spread in the Vancouver Sun, which was serialised across Canada was amazing. The Telegraph sent a photographer to take pictures of me for an article, I went to London for an amazing photoshoot and had my hair and makeup done all glam-like and made to feel so special. I’ve been surprised and pleased to have been asked to do so many interviews about my blog. My recipes have been in Cosmopolitan, Grazia, Good Housekeeping and so many others. I’ve got a massive stack of newspaper and magazine clippings that I’m so, so proud of. I was at such a low point when the blog started, so very low, that I don’t mean to boast about any successes, but I’m just really happy with all of the opportunities.
As my blog grows up, I’ve started to branch into vegetable-heavy breakfasts, snacks, drinks and other meals. A girl can only eat so many desserts so I’ve started to share the vegetable-heavy meals that my family enjoys, particularly on Instagram. I’m passionate about veg at every meal and would probably collapse in shock like a damsel in too tight a corset if there wasn’t anything green on my plate. Kale is my friend.
My most popular recipes since I started my blog are:
Kale and Apple Cake with Apple Icing
Cucumber and Lemon Cake with Elderflower Icing
Beetroot Chocolate Protein Balls
Carrot Jam
Stinging Nettle and Lemon Cake with Lemon Icing and Blackberries
Cauliflower and Chocolate Ice Lollies with Pistachio Dust
Sweet Pea and Vanilla Cake with Lemon Icing and Pea Shoots
Avocado and Pistachio Vegan Ice Cream
Kale and Orange Cupcakes with Orange Icing
Let’s share this birthday cake. This decadent chocolate cake filled with pureed cauliflower (you can’t taste it!) and topped with a rather sinful salted cinnamon caramel frosting. It is a celebration after all. It’s a celebration that I’d like to share with all of my lovely readers. Thanks for your comments, likes and tweets, for sending me pictures of my recipes that you’ve made, for all of the support. I really do appreciate it all so very much.
Get the recipe for Chocolate Cauliflower Cake!
- 75g (2 handfuls) raw cauliflower florets
- 100g (½ cup) plain full-fat yogurt
- 100ml (½ cup) rapeseed or vegetable oil
- 175g (¾ cup) sugar
- 2 eggs
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 250g (2 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour
- 75g (½ cup) cocoa powder
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 180 ml (¾ cup) buttermilk (or cow’s milk with 1 teaspoon of lemon juice stirred in)
- 115g (½ cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 200g (1 cup) brown sugar
- 3-4 tablespoons milk
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 cup powdered icing sugar
- Preheat the oven to 175C/350F. Grease and line 2x9” round cake tins
- Steam or boil the cauliflower for a few minutes until tender. Drain, rinse under cold water to cool and purée. Set aside.
- Beat the yogurt, oil and sugar together in a large bowl. Add the eggs, one at a time and beating each one in well. Stir in the pureed cauliflower and vanilla.
- In a separate bowl, whisk the flour, cocoa, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Alternating, add ⅓ of the flour mixture to the egg mixture and gently combine, then ⅓ of the buttermilk mixture. Repeat until all combined.
- Pour the mixture into the prepared tins and bake for 35 minutes or until an inserted skewer comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes in the tins and then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely before icing.
- Melt the butter over a gentle heat. Add the brown sugar, vanilla, cinnamon and milk Stirring heat for approx 3 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in the powdered icing sugar. Frost the cooled cake as desired.
Eat your vegetables, everyone. In cake.
Like this cauliflower cake? Please follow me for more vegetable foodie inspiration on Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and my new Facebook page!
Jessica
Hey!
I’m hoping to make a cake for my sister in law with some cauliflower in it.
I’d like to make it lemon flavoured though. Do you think I could make this same recipe but leave out the cocoa and cinnamon, substituting for grated lemon and maybe some lemon extract?
Thanks!
Kate Hackworthy
Hi Jessica,
I haven’t tried it, but those substitutions sound like they should work and the lemon should be strong enough to overpower the cauliflower. Let me know how it goes!
Kate
Becky
Oh my goodness that cake looks delish
plasterers bristol
Yum yum. Such a delicious recipe. Thanks for sharing this.
Simon
Sorin Vlad
Hi Kate,
I have seen you have many women and especially English speaking followers. I am a man and I like to try to cook different things and I am from Romania. I am happy to tell you that I have tried this recipe and it has been very good. It is for the first time I see dessert made with vegetables. In fact I know the carrot cake but this is all. Now you can say that you have a follower from Romania. Thank you for the interesting idea you present.
Lindsay
Sounds fab…how do you make the cauliflower puree?
Emily @amummytoo
You’re so clever! Another ingenious recipe, perfect for your awesome blogging milestone 🙂
Life Loving
Congratulations! You’ve achieved a lot since having your blog. No wonder it seems to have taken off, this recipe looks really good. I’d never imagined putting cauliflower into a cake, but I like the idea of it. It looks tasty.
Sally @ Life Loving
Christina
Congratulations! I do have one question related to this wonderful sounding cauliflower cake. How do you make the cauliflower puree that is used in the cake? Thanks!
petiteraisin
I’m a bit confused here as your recipe for the cake calls for yogurt and oil, and aren’t mentioned in the directions at all. Then it mentions to cream the butter with the sugar, but there isn’t a quantity of butter for the cake? I was totally starting to make this and will have to wing it!
Kate Hackworthy
Sorry, I have amended it back to my original notes. I hope it turned out okay.
Johanna @ Green Gourmet Giraffe
It is wonderful just how much blogging can add to our lives – congratulations for all your successes and for all your wonderful recipes – this recipe sounds intriguing like many of yours
laura_howtocook
Who would have thought, cauliflower in a cake! You are a genius and I am happy for your second blog anniversary. Here’s to many more years and successes 🙂
Jan @GlugofOil
First of all happy blog anniversary! Now that cake is amazing – how you even think up such a thing – it’s brilliant!
Sarah (@tamingtwins)
So many congratulations on an awesome two years. Your recipes and your blog itself are a total inspiration. You deserve so much success! x
Kavey
Happy blogiversary to you! And wooah, that cake looks so good!
Helen @ Scrummy Lane
Happy blogiversary! You’ve done a great job here. I would never think to put veggies in a dessert, apart from carrots in carrot cake (oh, and perhaps beetroot in chocie cake … mmm)
Anyway, what an interesting idea to put cauli in a choc cake. Would love to try that!
Nayna Kanabar (@SIMPLYF00D)
Cauliflower in cake looks very innovative, can you taste the cauliflower in the cake at all???
Kate Hackworthy
No, you can’t taste it! You could with my first trial – so I tweaked this and added a bit less. The flavour is hidden by the chocolate. 🙂
ahaidari
Should the cauliflower be raw or cooked? In the ingredients it says raw cauliflower florets, but then in the instructions it says “pureed cauliflower.” Should I steam it before I puree it?
Kate Hackworthy
Hi, steam or boil it and then purée it in a blender, food processor or with a hand held stick blender. Make sure it’s cooled before adding it to the other ingredients. ?
Janice (@FarmersgirlCook)
Congratulations on all your prizes, very well deserved. That’s an amazingly creative cake.
Kate Hackworthy
Thanks Janice!
Croque-Maman (@CroqueMaman)
Happy blog birthday! What a list of achievement, this is amazing! You really need to celebrate indeed!!!
Kate Hackworthy
Thanks – time has really flown by. I can’t believe it has been two years!
Kathrine Latham
Congrats on two years! It’s easy to see that you are working hard and loving it. Keep it up, please. I’m loving your recipes! One quick question: When you say add mashed potatoes, do you mean mashed cauliflower? I could see using either for this cake.
Kate Hackworthy
Oops! I’m muddled up because the last cake was potato! Thanks for your lovely words. 😀
fabfood4all
What a fabulous looking cake and what a surprise people would have hearing that it contains cauliflower:-) Happy anniversary Katherine – here’s to the years ahead:-)
Kate Hackworthy
Definitely a surprise! Thanks Camilla 😀
@trulymadly7
Happy blog birthday and a wonderful recipe too!
Kate Hackworthy
Thanks Megan. Two years has come so quickly!
recipesfromapantry
Happy blog birthday and here is to many more years.
Kate Hackworthy
Thanks Bintu!!
K @ Eat.Love.Live
Happy birthday to your blog! Wow, I would have never thought to add cauliflower to a cake. It looks great. Your recipes are so inventive #recipeoftheweek K x
Kate Hackworthy
I love my crazy veg cakes :D. Thanks for your lovely words.
jensfood9
Such a beautiful looking cake. Congratulations on 2 years of blogging 🙂
Kate Hackworthy
Thanks Jen! Hopefully many more to come 🙂
Elizabeth
Happy Blogaversary – such a fantastic achievement over these last two years – and here’s to your future adventures! Thank you for linking your beautiful cake up with the Shop Local Challenge too! 🙂
Kate Hackworthy
Thanks so much Elizabeth! Here’s to both of our future adventures!
Hannah | The Swirling Spoon
Congratulations on your achievements! Two years doesn’t seem like very long to me in the blogging scheme of things to have achieved so much. Killing it!
This cake looks like a chocolate mud cake <3
Kate Hackworthy
Ooooooh chocolate mud cake! YUM! Thanks so much, Hannah 🙂
superfitbabe
Challenge accepted! Have any chickpea recipes?
Kate Hackworthy
No! I’ve been meaning to make a chickpea recipe for ages!!
Julie's Family Kitchen
Happy Blog Birthday 🙂
Kate Hackworthy
Thanks so much, Julie!
Keep Calm and Fanny On
Happy Blog Birthday lovely lady
Lucy Bakingqueen74
What a gorgeous cake, and congratulations on your two years on your blog. You’ve made a lot of great achievements too, well done! So impressive.
Thanks for linking up to #creditcrunchmunch