Our family enjoyed a birthday celebration over Memorial Weekend. A homemade German Chocolate cake played a major role in the jocularity, as has been noted in previous posts at this site. Perhaps more than once. Because our family loves this cake. Really, really loves it.
To the point of obsession.
Which explains my selfish determination to create a completely dairy-free version. No way did I want to a) tame a perfectly good dessert obsession, or b) snivel in the corner while everyone else enjoyed the stuff. And you know what? My experiment was a complete success, right down to the coconut-pecan frosting.
Score!
The original cake recipe used to be printed on the inside of the German Chocolate package. (The ingredient list doesn’t include any milk products. Yipee!) But due to the cupcake craze sweeping the country, the German Chocolate powers that be replaced the cake recipe with a cupcake version.
But never fear.
Thanks to the magic of the worldwide web,you can just click this link for the original German Chocolate cake recipe. To make it dairy-free, replace the cup of butter with 2 Earth Balance buttery vegan sticks. Then replace the buttermilk with soured rice milk. (Put 1 tablespoon vinegar in a measuring cup and add rice milk to the 1 cup line. Let sit 15 minutes.)
Now, onto the frosting.
To make the frosting, you can use the recipe printed inside the German Chocolate box or a simpler recipe my mom found years ago in a magazine. It is printed below. In either case, to make it dairy-free, substitute 1 Earth Balance buttery vegan stick for the 1/2 cup butter. Replace the evaporated milk with an equal amount of almond milk. (Next time I’m going to try coconut milk and see what happens.)
Easy Coconut-Pecan Filling and Frosting
3/4 cup evaporated milk 1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar 1/2 cup butter or margarine
1 teaspoon vanilla 3 egg yolks, slightly beaten
1 1/3 cups shredded coconut 1 cup chopped pecans
Combine milk, sugars, butter and vanilla in a sauce pan. Bring to a full boil, stirring constantly. Remove from heat. (Mixture may appear curdled.) Quickly stir a small amount of hot mixture into the egg yolks; then pour that mixture back into sauce pan. Return to a boil, stirring constantly. Remove from heat. Add coconut and pecans. Cool to spreading consistency, stirring occasionally.
*Cookbooks tell you to frost between the layers and on the top of a German chocolate cake, but not on its sides. Mom always frosted the sides (it’s a little tricky) to keep the cake moist.
I’m really excited about this recipe! I make a german chocolate cake every year for my husbands birthday, However, I’m recently gluten and dairy intolerant so finding this is pretty much a life saver 🙂
I do, although, have one small concern. The bakers german sweet chocolate contains milk solids, doesnt it?
Hi Erin,
I don’t have a package here to verify, but I checked the ingredient list online and you’re right. It does have some milk solids. Sorry about that!
However, the amount must be very small because it never bothers me. Of course, when I make it, it’s for a crowd (big cake) and I only eat one piece. Plus I take allergy medication beforehand in case I splurge with a little ice cream.
Have you worked up a carrot cake recipe with icing? My hubby is severly lactose intolerant. This recipe is great and doesn’t bother him at all. By the way cocoa butter is not a milk product so there are actually no milk solids in the bakers german sweet chocolate!
Hi Melanie,
No I haven’t done a carrot cake recipe. That sounds like a good challenge for the future. There are some non-dairy cream cheese options that might work. Thanks for the suggestion and the info about cocoa butter.
Jolene
You can sub cream cheese with vegan tofutti. It is tofu based and no dairy. That would work for a cream cheese icing.
That’s good to know. This original recipe doesn’t have cream cheese, but maybe that would work for carrot cake.
Jolene,
For the almond milk you used for the frosting, did you use regular almond milk or condensed almond milk?
Patricia, I used regular almond milk. I didn’t even know there was a condensed version!