Vegan Baileys Birthday Cake Filled with Creamy Dairyfree White Chocolate, Coffee Buttercream
This Vegan Baileys Birthday Cake is infused with the flavours of the famous liqueur but without any of the dairy. The sponge is delicately flavoured with whiskey, cocoa and vanilla which compliments perfectly the dairyfree white chocolate, coffee buttercream! With a subtle whiskey hit, this is the perfect cake for any lover of Baileys but definitely not one for the children! The cake was decorated to order with a lilac fondant, peach roses and handmade swirly Peacock Feathers for a special birthday!
Apparently, February is a very popular month for birthday’s, most of them seem to be within the same week. Actually a lot of them are on the same day! You may have seen Elodie’s Sleeping Beauty Cake for her 4th Birthday last week but she actually shares her birthday with 3 people on Hubby’s side of the family. Her Nanny, Great Nanny & a Cousin’s little boy all have the same birthday as The Ginger Peachick!
The roses are really easy to make. The peach fondant is equal quantities of yellow and pink fondant kneaded together. There are loads of ways of doing it but this video by The Cherished Cake shows one of the easiest! The Peacock feathers are made by kneading green and blue fondant together until they are swirled together. Cut out a petal or oval shape, then layered with a small oval of green fondant, tiny ball of blue and finally a silver dragee. I found the gorgeous ribbon on Etsy, it was just under £2 and did wrap around the cake and then some!
The lilac fondant is purple and white fondant kneaded together in a ratio of 2:1. To cover this 20cm cake which is around 6cm in height took 750g of fondant (250g purple & 500g white) I was really pleased with the overall look of this cake and I am reliably informed that it tasted pretty good too! Having never drank Baileys due to the large quantities of cream Hubby was in charge of taste testing to make sure the flavour was as close as possible – I suspect the number of spoonfuls needed to check this was probably not as many as he had!!
The buttercream in this cake is made with Tesco Freefrom White Chocolate Buttons. These do contain Soy Lecithin which the Peachicks can tolerate. If, however you need a completely soyfree recipe then simply substitute for milk chocolate and leave out the extra cocoa powder!
Recipe for Vegan Baileys Birthday Cake:
Vegan 'Baileys' Birthday Cake (Dairyfree, Eggfree, Soyfree*)
*The buttercream in this cake is made with Tesco Freefrom White Chocolate Buttons. These do contain Soy Lecithin which the Peachicks can tolerate. If, however you need a completely soyfree recipe then simply substitute for milk chocolate and leave out the extra cocoa powder!
Ingredients
For the Sponges
- 100 g Dairy Free Baking Block or Vegan Butter
- 100 ml Vegetable Oil (Sunflower, Canola, Vegetable)
- 200 g Brown Sugar
- 2 tsp Vanilla Extract
- 1.5 tsp Instant Coffee or Espresso Powder
- 300 ml Dairy Free, Milk Alternative
- 4 tbsp Whiskey
- 2 tbsp Cocoa Powder
- 100 g Plain Flour
- 275 g Self Raising Flour
- Salt
- 2 tbsp Ground Chia Seeds (or flax seeds)
For the Buttercream
- 3 tbsp Dairy Free, Milk Alternative
- 2 tbsp whiskey
- 1 tsp Vanilla Extract
- 1 tsp Instant Coffee or Espresso Powder
- 3 tbsp Cocoa Powder
- 50 g Dairy Free White Chocolate
- 100 g Dairy Free Baking Block or Vegan Butter
- 350 g Icing Sugar
For the Decorations
- 750 g Lilac Fondant 250g Purple + 500g White Kneaded Together
- Peach Roses & Peacock Feathers see Recipe Notes for instructions
- Edible Glue
Instructions
For the Sponges
- Preheat the oven to 170C and line a 20cm cake tin with greaseproof paper or silicon baking sheet.
- Pour a couple of tbsp of the coconut milk into a microwave safe mug. Add the coffee granules and vanilla extract and microwave on low for 30seconds. Stir in the whiskey and leave to cool slightly while you make the cake batter.
- In a large mixing bowl or stand mixer, cream the margarine, oil and sugar together until it is pale and fluffy. Turn to a low speed and pour in the whiskey mixture, rest of the dairyfree milk and cocoa powder.
- Sift together the plain flour, self raising flour and ground chia seeds before folding into the creamed mixture.Be careful not to over mix at this point as you don't want the sponge to be rubbery!
- Bake for 50-60mins or until a skewer comes out clean. Leave it to cool completely, in the fridge if possible, before slicing through the middle with a serrated knife.
For the Buttercream
- Over a double boiler melt the chocolate, whiskey, vanilla extract, coffee granules and milk together. Leave to cool slightly.
- In a large mixing bowl or stand mixer, cream the margarine, icing sugar and cocoa powder together until it is pale and fluffy. Turn to a low speed and pour in the whiskey chocolate mixture. Add another couple of tablespoons of icing sugar if the mixture starts to split.
- Scrape into a piping bag with a large round or star nozzle. Pipe a layer in between the cakes to sandwich them together. Next crumb coat the cake by piping a layer over the top and sides of the cakes before smoothing out.
- Allow the crumb coat to set while you get on and finish your chosen decorations!
For the Decorations
- Roll out the fondant about 1/8inch thick in a circle that is as wide as your cake diameter plus height of both sides. Place over the top of the cake and using a fondant smoother or hand carefully cover the cake smoothing out the creases and folds. (Wilton have a great YouTube video showing the whole process!)
- Place your decorations on the top of the cake and around the sides until you are happy with your design. Then stick them all down using edible glue or water to make the fondant sticky!
Notes
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Wow Midge! What a show stopper, the birthday girl must have been overjoyed to have had this made for her.
Angela x
Thank you! Apparenlty it did go down quite well! Just made her some cupcakes for mothers Day but shhhh its a surprise!
Oh wow – this looks AMAZING!! And such a fab flavour for a cake!! The bit about your hubby taking his taste testing role very seriously made me laugh!! Thanks for linking it up to #CookBlogShare 🙂 Eb x
Thank you! He does take it very seriously – he LOVES baileys though so if anyone was going to know what it should taste like its him!
Such a beautiful cake and the flavours sound amazing. I’m very familiar with the flavour of Bailey’s so I’d happily help with the taste testing if you send me a slice 🙂
LOL! Just experimenting with some cupcakes – we’ll have to have a big bloggers meet up with LOTS of cake!
You are so so clever! I am always in awe of your vegan cakes! This one sounds amazing….. but then as soon as I read Baileys, I was with you…… x
Thanks! I am told they were very good!!
Wow. How have I never thought to put whiskey in my cake icing before? Mine might not end up as beautiful, but it will be fun to give it a go. 🙂
Being dairyfree I’ve never had a Baileys but I do love whiskey! Apparently the cake was very nice – I am considering making another one today just so I can eat some! LOL!