Vegan Recipe: Sticky Orange Cake with Marmalade Glaze

I am using Vegan Week as an excuse to introduce you to one of my all-time favorite cakes. Vegan or no, this is the cake you should turn to if you ever have a craving for a damp tea cake fragrant with citrus and sticky with a luscious glaze. Seriously, doesn’t that look good right now, in the dark days of winter? This cake has a double bonus: It takes five minutes to make. Vegan, quick, easy, utterly foolproof and delicious — how can you not try it?

I first started making this cake a few years ago, when baking for a vegan friend. Dessert always seemed to be the hardest thing to figure out, when cooking for vegans, and I was thrilled to find a cake that was so easy, and so yummy. It seemed too good to be true!

This cake belongs to a breed of cakes known as“wacky cakes.”Supposedly they were very popular during the Depression and World War II given their freedom from expensive (and rationed) eggs and butter. Instead they rely on oil for fat, and on vinegar and baking soda for lift. The cake texture is a little less fine-crumbed and a little more damp than a classic butter cake. Personally, I like this, as I prefer my cakes on the very moist side.

This particular recipe has been around for a long time, and while I made a few small changes, it’s essentially unchanged.

This is a rather sweet cake, so I substituted a little brown sugar for a deeper flavor, and I also added a marmalade glaze for an extra-sticky touch. The slight bitterness of the marmalade complements the sweet cake in an utterly perfect way.

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