-- This recipe is part of the Harry Potter Inspired Recipes Week --
Qizilbash Quality Confectionary, established in 1854, announced last week that their wizarding confectionary development team has started to work on a healthier version of their popular Cauldron Cakes.
The upcoming version is said to be dairy-free, egg-free, and gluten-free, three allergens that many Hogwarts students have. It is said to feature a creamy hot chocolate center inside a fudgy cake so moist that any death eater would turn over in its grave. On top of each cauldron cake, people will discover a spoonful of dragviar, these mini green eggs come from a rare type of dragons only breeded in a little town in Romania.
It wouldn't be a good Harry Potter week without some cauldron cakes! These chocolate-dipped cakes are filled with a creamy almond milk chocolate cream, and topped with green tapioca pearls for a magical touch!
HOW TO MAKE CAULDRON CAKES
The base of our cauldron cakes will be fudgy chocolate muffins that we will turn upside down. The muffin batter is gluten-free and naturally-sweetened with coconut sugar. To add moisture I included a combination of applesauce and pumpkin purée. Then we have oat flour, almond flour, and a couple of flax eggs that act as a binder.
If you want to make slightly shorter cauldron cakes, use a demi-sphere mold instead of a muffin one.
DECORATING CAULDRON CAKES
Once our muffins are baked, let cool completely and dip in melted dark chocolate to create a shell. The shell will add crispiness and give our cauldron cakes a better, smoother look.
Quick tip: I recommend using a high percentage dark chocolate in order to have a thin shell. Don't use melted dark chocolate chips, the chocolate will be too thick and you will have trouble dipping your muffins.
- Handles and stick: With the leftover melted chocolate, we will draw the handles and sticks of our cauldron cakes. Use a piping bag or a spoon to draw them on a sheet of parchment paper.
- Feet: You can pipe rounds of melted chocolate on parchment paper, or simply use large chocolate chips (which I did).
Let the chocolate set before "sticking" the handles and feet on your cauldron cakes using, once again, melted chocolate.
Finally, we have the filling, which consists of almond milk, cacao powder, coconut cream, maple syrup, and cornstarch.
To add a vibrant green color, I used tapioca pearls colored with pandan extract. The tapioca pearls are pretty flavorless so they don't affect the flavors of this dessert. They just add a little chewy texture! If you don't have tapioca pearls on hand, you could prepare a matcha frosting instead and pipe it over the cakes.
These insanely fudgy cauldron cakes are fire! A crispy shell, a moist and tender cake, and a creamy chocolate cream. Chocolate lovers, this one is for you!
Let me know in the comments if you try this recipe!
Vegan Cauldron Cakes
Ingredients
Cream Filling
- ½ cup almond milk
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
- 2 tablespoon cacao powder
- 1 tablespoon maple syrup
- ¼ cup coconut cream
- 1 tablespoon praline paste (optional, adds a caramel flavor)
Cakes
- 2 tablespoon ground flax seeds
- 6 tablespoon water
- ⅔ cup oat flour
- ⅔ cup almond flour
- ½ cup cacao powder
- 2 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 cup coconut sugar
- ½ cup applesauce
- ½ cup pumpkin puree
- 2 tablespoon oil
- 2 teaspoon almond milk
- 1 and ½ cup chopped dark chocolate for dipping
Green Pearls
- 2 tablespoon tapioca pearls
- 1-2 drops pandan extract
Instructions
Cream Filling
- To a saucepan, add the almond milk, cornstarch, cacao powder, maple syrup, coconut cream, and praline paste if using. Whisk to dissolve the cornstarch and cacao powder.
- Heat over medium heat, whisking constantly, until the mixture thickens. Remove from heat, transfer to a bowl and cover with plastic film to touch. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours.
Cakes
- Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).
- Prepare the flax eggs: in a small bowl, whisk together the ground flax egg and water. Let it sit for 5 minutes.
- In the meantime, add the oat flour, almond flour, cacao powder, baking powder, salt, and coconut sugar to a large mixing bowl. Whisk until combined.
- Pour in the flax eggs, apple sauce, pumpkin purée, oil, and almond milk. Stir using a wooden spoon until well combined. Divide the batter between the 6 cavities of a silicon muffin pan, filling each cavity to the ⅘. Try to make the top smooth, this will result in a nicer shape after baking.
- Bake for about 25 minutes, or until the centers are set. Remove from the oven and let cool completely before removing from the pan.
Assemble
- Melt the dark chocolate over a double boiler. (You can temper the chocolate if you want crispy and shiny shells.)
- Using a small piping bag, draw some circles for the handles, and straight lines for the sticks on a piece of parchment paper. If you don't have a piping bag, you can use a spoon.
- Now, flip your muffins upside down. Prick one with a fork. Using a large spoon, drizzle the melted chocolate all over the muffin, except the flat top. I found this way to work better than simply dipping, which can sometimes result is losing the muffin inside the whole bowl of melted chocolate.
- Transfer the dipped muffins to a large plate lined with parchment paper and let cool completely. If you room temperature is warm, you can transfer the cakes to the refrigerator.
- Once the chocolate has set, use a small and sharp knife to carve the inside of each cake. Fill each one with chocolate cream to the top.
- Using melted chocolate, stick the handles and feet (I used chocolate chips) to each cauldron cake. Since your cakes will be cold the chocolate should set quickly.
- Now for the green pearls, bring a small pot of water to a boil. Once boiling, add the tapioca pearls and the pandan extract. Cook for about 5 minutes, or until the pearls are tender. Drain and transfer to a small bowl. Add one more drop of pandan extract and mix to combine.
- Top each cauldron cake with about 1 tablespoon of green pearls and enjoy! These cakes are better chilled, so keep them in the refrigerator. Cauldron cakes will keep for up to 3 days.
I'm so loving your take on Harry Potter foods! I loved the books and movies and now I smile and look forward to each day and a new recipe from you. Thank you for this little spot of fun and joy in an otherwise trying year.
Thanks Annie! 🙂 I'm really happy to hear you are enjoying the week!
Wow this is so creative! I love this recipe, and loving the theme. 🙂 This would be fun to try and make with others, I think. Healthy and innovative.
Thanks Cass! Really appreciate it 🙂
Hey Thomas.. thank you very much for the recipe and the tips.. cannot wait to try these.. I had a query though.. if I want to use regular all purpose flour what would the measurement be for that.. please advise.. thanks a ton again..
Hey Dee! Ah, that's a tough question as I haven't tried with all-purpose flour. I worked on it to be gluten-free, so it's hard to say but to keep moisture and a fudgy texture I would recommend using at least half almond flour, even if you use all-purpose flour.
Love this so much! The family always take a whole week to watch Harry Potter movies. We do it every Christmas season. This year , thanks to you dear, Thomas... treats as well. Love this idea! Thank you so much!
Awesome! I also love watching Harry Potter movies during the holidays, hope you will like the recipes 😉
Hello,
I live in sweden, where it's hard to find pumpkin puree. Any ideas for substituting?
Hello Eira,
I live in France and I don't have access to canned pumpkin purée either, so I make my own by roasting pumpkin and then purée the flesh.
You could try using applesauce instead but you might have to lower the amount as applesauce has more moisture than pumpkin purée. I would go with 1/4 cup applesauce as a substitute for pumpkin purée, so a total of 3/4 cup of applesauce for the whole recipe.
Hi Thomas!
I would love to try this recipe but cannot do any grains or most sugars at all...so no oat flour. What do you think would be a good substitute for that?
I can't do coconut sugar either, but thinking that granulated allulose might work here, as erythritol (as in Lakanto "monkfruit" sugar) upsets my body systems.
Thanks in advance for your kind answers and the incredible art/work you are creating!!! I'm going to make your vegan raw milk chocolate tomorrow!!
Hi Maria,
Hum...that's tough. You could try buckwheat flour, but I guess it will change the texture, and you will have to adjust the amount of liquid ingredients.
Regarding the sugar, I'm not familiar at all with sweeteners.
Thanks for your kind words!
I’m super excited to try this recipe, but I have to avoid cornstarch right now. Can I use tapioca starch, or is there another substitute you’d recommend?
Yes, tapioca or potato starch should work as well!