This cake has delicious two modes: cleanse + celebration!
If I were a cake, I’d like to think that I would be as versatile, sweet, gentle, sturdy and frankly as PERFECT as this Golden Soma Cake. This is the cake I’ve been eating all week as “snack” on my spring reset (it’s that virtuous,) but it’s also the cake that I baked 5x for Leo’s birthday party last weekend. One – a relatively tranquil, gentle scenario. The other the absolute opposite of all of that. It’s a true MacGuyver of a cake and I love it to the moon for it.
Before your eyebrows raise too high, let’s revisit the Ayurvedic definition of “what’s good for us.” The answer is – EVERYTHING. And also NOTHING. Ha.
Everything everything everything can bring benefit – or detriment – into the body. The determining factor between the two being how suitable it is for our unique constitutions, for the season, and for our environment – both internal and external.
This is to say that eating too much kale salad can absolutely be a detriment to your well-being. So can eating too much cake. So can eating too much of THIS cake!
Generally speaking, though, when we stay clearly in the lane of consuming foods that are from the earth, as unprocessed as possible, easy to digest, and suitable for the purpose of fueling the energy levels of our lives we’re on the right track. And this is where this cake hits all the bases.
Both great questions! This cake is a very simple one, made with rice and almond flours, coconut and/or almond milk, warming spices from the Soma Milk Mix swirled into the batter, coconut sugar and coconut oil. Oh! And eggs – or not (see the Recipe Notes below!) All of the ingredients here are easy to digest, and each provides something that the body needs to function properly: fat, fiber, minerals, nutrients, bioenergetic boosts, thermogenic warming, and on. Nothing in this cake is for flavor alone. And nothing is “empty.”
This cake uses coconut sugar instead of refined sugar to sweeten it, and also to give it texture. Coconut sugar is a very special substance because it’s unrefined and still contains all of it’s vital minerals and nutrients, AND has a glycemic index that’s half of refined sugar. (The glycemic index of a food indicates how much it raises your blood sugar, and typically how quickly – essentially an indicator of how quickly a food will be absorbed into the blood.) For the sake of comparison, here are a few common foods + their GI indices:
Coconut Sugar: GI ~35 . Contains inulin (a type of soluble fiber), which slows glucose absorption. Also contains vitamins + minerals.
Refined Sugar: GI ~65. Spikes blood sugar quickly because it doesn’t contain fiber, minerals or nutrients – no nutritional value or benefit.
Dates: GI ~55-60 varies depending on variety + ripeness. Contain fiber, nutrients + minerals.
Sweet Potatoes: GI~40-60 depending on cooking method. Boiled sweet potatoes have a lower GI (~44) vs. baked (~60), but both contain valuable fiber, nutrients and minerals.
If we compare coconut sugar to other foods that we eat (and specifically that both Western + Ayurvedic medicine recommend readily as powerhouse foods,) we can see that as far as being a “naughty” additive, coconut sugar – in moderation, say in an occasional slice of cake – is kind of a rock star move.
As for getting on the cleanse, I’m always offering 1:1 consultations and often, in this work, we discover that a digestive reset is necessary to restore balance in the body. This Soma Milk Cake is one of the recipes I recommend to fuel the week of cleansing and rebooting! : )
I made this cake originally to fuel the spring reset I’m finishing this week…but Leo also loves it! And bonus that we could make it gluten/dairy/egg free to suit his current dietary needs. So that’s exactly what I did. I 3x’d the recipe and baked the cake in 9″ rounds instead of loaf pans, then layered it with the coconut frosting (below!) I tell you all about it in the recipe + Recipe Notes below.
I made one additional cake (so 4x the recipe in total) and baked the batter of the 4th cake divided between a small 4″ cake pan (for the topper) and a 9″ loaf pan. I mixed, baked and cooled the cake according to the directions below, then when the cake was completely cool (chilled in the fridge overnight) I cut the cake in half lengthwise, trimmed the edges and cut each half into three 2×3″ rectangle cakes, slicing one of them in half to make a caboose + an engine. I iced the cakes – the layer cake and the little rectangles with the coconut frosting, coloring the frosting for the “trains” with this food coloring. Then I assembled the layers, placed the tiny topper cake in the center. I placed the iced rectangles around the topper, with the caboose + the engine at the ends of my “train,” and used mini Oreo cookies to make “wheels,” mini M+M’s as little dotted windows on each car, and a single yellow mini M+M as a headlight. Lastly I cut a single pirohette cookie in the top of the engine as a smoke stack. I used these favorite cookies of Leo’s.
Then I placed a number candle in the center and voila! A train cake! (Whew!)
Is a recipe I could eat everyday, and still enjoy for special occasions. It’s tender, not too sweet, a satisfying little snack or a truly precious treat. One of the things I love about it that it can easily be made allergen free without sacrificing on flavor, texture or enjoyment – none of our guests knew that this cake was free of gluten/dairy/eggs or refined sugar…nor did they need to. If you’re looking to replace the eggs in this recipe (as I did for Leo’s cake,) use an egg replacer. I tell you how below.
This little cake is sturdy enough for pockets IF the weather isn’t too warm. If it gets too toasty, it will be crumbly…but just as delicious.
Note that the coconut frosting is also a killer recipe and, unlike buttercream, will actually stand up to a tiny bit of heat. And it won’t separate as easily as buttercream so it’s a bit more sturdy. If you find it challenging to work with, warm it up gently and you’ll find it stirs back together and can be whipped up easily. (The more you whip though, the more the air will cool things down so…use caution!)
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