Vegan Hummingbird Cake with Orange Buttercream Frosting

This is a southern cake of the highest order. If you grew up in the south (I was thrust there at the tender age of fourteen), you know this cake. According to some, it's origins were first noted in Southern Living magazine. It gets its name--again according to some--from the sweetness hummingbirds love. However, I say it was probably created by a menopausal woman who had a hankering for an over-the-top outrageous, sweet cake and had a can of pineapples and an old banana sitting around and dug in to making this yummy dessert. I love to peruse Southern Living magazine. I subscribe to Midwest Living magazine (no, it is not called Vegan Midwest Living, either). You can't beat with a stick the down home and plain "food grub" coverage of simple foods. A vegan cook worth her weight can make nearly anything vegan. But you have to know where your food recipes come from to truly appreciate what it is you are setting out to do. Several recipes for this cake exist. Most make it with a can of crushed pineapple and banana. I have a husband who cannot eat pineapple (I am shocked also). So I had to figure out how to create a next-to version of the cake without this key ingredient. I settled on a can of spiced peaches. They worked beautifully. Grant it, you will not have that sort of pucker-up taste you'd have with the pineapple, but you still get a good, moist, yummy cake. Now, my other secret weapon is a new cookbook called: Cake Keeper Cakes by Lauren Chattmen. So far I have been completely pleased as punch with this little gem--I highly recommend this book! For starters, the cakes are quick to make, not super fancy and are designed to do just what she says, to be "keepers"--that is, around for a while. I like also that the cakes are not uber-huge and require a dinner party to finish off--they are in 8 or 9 inch pans or loaf pans, bundt and so on. Just the right size for that cake fix you have. I have it quite often! To make this 8" square cake a layer cake with frosting, I simply cut the cake in half. Then frosted it--no frosting on a cake? No problem! It sort of takes on that Sara Lee baked loaf cake appearance doing so. I took a picture before and after for visual assistance. It keeps best in the fridge and personally, I think tastes better the day after.

Vegan Hummingbird Cake

1/2 cup toasted pecan (finely chopped)

1 can spiced peaches, drained and chopped

1 ripened banana, mashed

1 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1 cup sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1 1/2 teaspoon Ener-G Egg Replacer mixed with 2 tablespoons warm water

1 2/2 teaspoon Ener-G Egg Replacer mixed with 1 tablespoon warm water

6 tablespoons oil (you could use olive oil, or even flavored olive oil)!

1/2 cup vegan sour cream

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350. Grease an 8" square baking pan. Line the bottom with parchment paper. Combine the dry ingredients, including the nuts in a medium mixing bowl. Be sure to make two separate batches of the Egg Replacer (the recipe does better with a mix for replacing 1 egg and 1 egg yolk). Add the vanilla to the oil in a bowl and mix well. Now add all of the remaining wet ingredients and mix by hand with a spoon. This cake does best mixed this way. Pour the batter into the pan and smooth the top. Bake about 30-35 minutes or until a knife inserted in the center of it comes out clean.

Orange Buttercream Frosting

1/2 cup Earth Balance Butter at room temperature

1/2 cup Earth Balance Shortening at room temperature

2 cups powdered sugar--or more, depending upon consistency you get

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1/2 orange (squeeze its juice out)

zest of 1/2 orange

Place all ingredients in a bowl and mix until a fluffy frosting.