It’s no secret that the essence of the Jewish holidays is food. Yes, it is a big deal. Each holiday has it’s own traditions, rules, restrictions, and expectations. We love to make a fuss and we love to eat.
So Passover is around the corner, and the basic rule is that leavened bread and any product that is fermented or can cause fermentation may not be eaten, including five grains: wheat, rye, barley, oats, and spelt. Why? because, life is not easy, just as it was not easy for the ancient Israelites who ran away from Egypt, and didn’t have time for gourmet food.
So when I stumbled upon a bag of chickpea flour, I had a eureka moment. What if, what if, what if I can bake a cake with the… hummus flour?! It’ll work for Passover. Well, I decided to explore. I found many recipes for some pancakes, flat breads, veggie burgers, and such. Nope, not satisfying. I need a cake. Based on the interesting fact that I did find– this flour can substitute the use of eggs, I decided to be brave, and try to bake a simple chocolate cake.
The reported results of the experiment: three very happy children who loved the cake.
The potential benefits: wheat-free, gluten free, easy to digest, vitamins and minerals = nutritional.
you’ll need:
- greased 9″ round cake pan. I used the spring-form one. A square pan will also do.
- 2 cups chickpea flour;
- half cup sugar, or if you’d rather keep out of sugar, use Raw honey, or stevia, but feel free to adjust sweeteners according to your sweet tasting buds (most cake recipes call for 1.5 cups of sugar, but we don’t like it that sweet);
- 1 tsp baking powder;
- 1 tsp baking soda;
- 2 Tbsp good quality cocoa powder;
- 100 gr/3.5 oz of good quality dark chocolate bar (I use 85% and up cocoa);
- 2/3 cup olive oil;
- 1.5 cup water.
how-to:
heat oven to 350°f.
combine all dry ingredients together, and mix well.
pour olive oil and water into the mixed flour, and whisk slowly together, until smooth and all the flour dissolved.
break the chocolate bar into a microwave-safe glass dish, and melt in 20 second time segments, mixing it between each time, until chocolate is uniformly smooth and liquified.
add 1 Tbsp of the batter into the melted chocolate, mix together, and add all melted chocolate back into the batter. mix well together.
pour the whole mixture onto greased pan, and into the oven it goes for 35 minutes. Don’t expect a high cake, this one’s a shorty.
notes:
- the kids did recommend, however, to add chocolate chips. since the cake is bit on the drier side, that could be a good advice.
- when adding the water, you may notice that you need a bit more than 1.5 cups. you want to have a smooth fluidish batter.
- you may need more than 35 minutes- all depends on your oven.
- yes- some add ice cream on top, some add frosting. I just like to dunk it in tea. the kids like it as is…
check out my gluten free carrot cake, and gluten free blueberry cake.
Looks great! I don’t often think to use chickpea flour in my gluten-free baked goods, but I’ll have to give this a try. Thanks for sharing!
you’re welcome ! let me know the outcome 🙂
Thanks Ayelet! That’s awesome, I’ll try that this weekend. Thanks for sharing!
Thanks Michal, and I learned something from you- the flaxseed as substitute for eggs.
Thank you, thank you! My son is allergic to dairy, eggs, and most grains. This recipe inspires me to bake a real cake for his 1st birthday. So happy!
you’re most welcome, Jennifer! Let me know how it came out.
I did a test run last week … came out great! I am making it again now, hope to make it looks a little like a bear, so we’ll see how that goes. I added more sugar this time as I could taste the olive oil a bit the first round. Thanks again!
So good to hear of your success, Jennifer!
You could always cut a bit on the olive oil – or use other kind of oil instead, and add sugar or maple, or even use the sweetened cocoa powder.
I guess my family is used to the olive oil taste.
Here’s a little secret- when i have guests coming- I do add more sugar.. 🙂
It was so good – I upped the sugar a bit and used lighter olive oil, and it had the kids coming for seconds. No one believed it was healthy, and I loved that my son got eat cake on his birthday! =) Thanks again.
I tried it with 1/2 cup melted coconut oil and a mashed banana. It was delicious.
That’s sounds delish!! I’ll also try it w/banana and coconut butter 🙂 thanks !!
I have been looking for a gram flour cake recipe for ages. Do you think this would work without the chocolate/cocoa, but with lemon and poppy seed instead, or would the gram flour taste be too strong?
Hey Jobot,
You know what- the reason I got the chocolate recipe was because I explored and tried. The flour may have a bit of a dominant taste, but maybe you could set it off with a little honey/sugar? I love the combination of lemon and poppy seed. How about you try it and let us know? I’d love to learn something new 🙂
Thanks for the great inspiration, I made it with 3 tbs of honey, carrots raisins,and 1 egg and it turned out beautifully!
Sounds good Lisa! I’m always happy to learn new things and explore. Thanks !
I made this as specified the first time except with Splenda instead of sugar, and it was pretty good, but I used cheap, highly aromatic olive oil and I could taste it when it was baked (though my boyfriend couldn’t and loved it once I put some unhealthy frosting on it, haha). It was also a little dry, as warned. The second time I made it, I substituted the olive oil with unsweetened applesauce, and it was pretty much PERFECT. I used a cup of Splenda and with the applesauce it could probably use a little less (I thought a cup was perfect with the olive oil but my boyfriend prefers sweeter; he hasn’t tried the second version yet!), but it’s very moist and the chocolate flavor is light but tasty and covers up the chickpea taste very well. I can’t believe something that’s gluten-free, dairy-free, low-sugar, low-fat, and with starch low on the glycemic index, tastes so good!!!
Yeah!! Applesauce is indeed great, and moistens the cake. Glad it worked out. Thanks for sharing.
Hi
If I want the cake to be more moist most comments I read says add in applesauce. Please can you advise on the quantity of applesauce?
Hey Sam, try adding 1/2-3/4 cup of applesauce. Let us know… 🙂
The recipe asks for 2/3 cup of oil so if I want it to be moist should I combine 1/3 cup oil and 1/3 cup appleasuace? Or just applesauce of 2/3 cup?
Just made this and it was delish! The bitter chickpea batter had me worried but end result is a MOST perfect chocolate cake. Using ingredients I had on had, I skipped the chocolate bar, used 2/3 cups cocoa powder instead, opted for coconut oil, used 3/4 cups (ish) coconut sugar and and 8″ cake pan. If you’re on the fence about this recipe, just go make it, it’s awesome. A million thanks for posting this recipe!
Hey Andrea,
I’m so glad you liked the cake and recipe. Hope to have some more trials with chickpea flour in the future.
What is coconut sugar? that’s the first I hear about it.
Thanks for the kind words,
All the best,
Ayelet
Can’t wait to try this soon! I wonder if I could substitute agave nectar, maple syrup, or stevia for the sugar? (I don’t use white or brown sugar)
I would surely try, why not? I also like to use pure maple syrup. How about you try it and let me know? 🙂
I made the cake! I followed everything to a T except I only used 1/3 cup olive oil and I substituted 1/3 cup of maple syrup for the sugar. I found the cake a tiny bit dry and had bit of a strange aftertaste due to (I believe) the chickpea flour (first time I ever used it)… so I made an avocado/cocoa/soy milk/vanilla/maple syrup pudding and used it as “frosting”… and I loved the end result!! The pudding made the cake more moist and hid the strange aftertaste. Will definitely make this again… thanks so much!! 🙂
Well, Julia, sounds like you found the perfect combination.
As for the dryness: It has been suggested before, that perhaps try and add some apple sauce to the olive oil, to make it more moist.
As for the frosting: I also add that from time to time. Only, I use a whole package of 70% chocolate, with a little bit of water (heat it carefully and spread over cake).
How do you make the pudding to be eaten as a pudding? Will you share? 🙂
thanks for your comments, best !
Here is my pudding recipe…. 1 avocado, 1 tsp vanilla, 1/4 cocoa powder, 1/4 cup maple syrup, 6 tsp non-dairy milk…. blend and enjoy!!!
Oops… 1/4 CUP cocoa powder 🙂
I am going to try this soon, thanks. Tip: If you find gram flour too strong, use pea flour.
Thanks for the tip Sudika.
How did it go with the cake?
Thanks for the recipe! I used coconut sugar instead and turned out so great as cupcakes! I topped it with tahini icing (just tahini, sugar or honey and almond milk to thin it out) and my kids loved it. Now I don’t feel so guilty giving them cake.
Dear Savannah- With Raw Tahini, it sounds amazing. Wish I could taste it 🙂 Thanks for sharing.
This is EXACTLY what I was looking for when I did a google search for “chickpea flour chocolate cake”! Thank you very much, I can’t wait to put this recipe good use!
Thank you for the kind words. I can’t wait to hear if you liked it 🙂
[…] cake. I made a diary free cake in case one of ladies who lives locally popped in. The recipe is here – it was interesting to make it and although it sounds weird it actually tastes very nice. […]
Good day! I could have sworn I’ve been to this blog before but after browsing through some of the post I realized it’s new to me.
Nonetheless, I’m definitely happy I found it and I’ll be bookmarking and checking back often!
We used this recipe and added a bit more olive oil as well as used vanilla liquid stevia. It was beautiful! Thank you!
thank YOU for letting me know. Bon appetite 🙂
welcome! glad you liked it 🙂
I just baked this cake – and it turned out absolutely DELICIOUS!
I swapped out white sugar for brown sugar, and added dairy-free chocolate chips to it. I also used a dairy-free ganache frosting (simply swap heavy cream for coconut milk).
It turned out sooo moist and sooo chocolatey. I could easily serve this cake without the recipient having any clue it is gluten, dairy, and egg free!
Thank you!
You are most welcome. I have come a long way since that recipe, and no longer use any refined industrial sugar, but rather maple syrup or raw honey or even just chopped dates…
I also use coconut milk for almost anything 🙂
Thank you for the comment! Enjoy
Woow i love the chocolate cake.. thanks a lot for sharing with us
Yay Mr James Megan, thanks !
Hi Ayelet,
This is the first cake I ever made in my life and it was sooo easy. We had a few hiccups as I made the batter slightly fluidish, it started leaking out of the tin and i had no other tins to use so I used a bread tin haha.
It came out nicely (considering it is my first time) but I will learn and improve. I think the chocolate was a bit too much (I’m guessing you love dark choccie 🙂 I used 75%, next time I will use a bit less.
I was thrown in baking as my 15 month old has egg and dairy allergy so no shop bought bread, My husband makes steam bread sometimes but it is never enough.
Thanks again for sharing your recipe.
Vivian. X
Wow Vivian, So glad it worked out for you. I’m sure it’ll only get better as you add more things that you like- maybe applesauce?
And the steamed bread sounds very interesting too. I’d love to hear about it, if you care to share.
Thanks!! Ayelet
Hi Ayelet,
I have made this cake twice – once with choco chips and yesterday with walnut chunks and both the times it turned out fabulous! I have a very happy toddler and husband loving this cake. Also, to my surprise my husband also couldn’t tell it from other all purpose flour cakes. Thanks for sharing the recipe.
So very happy to share things that turned out a success. So glad your family is enjoying it Richa. Thanks for the note.
Hi,
This came out perfect and lovely! I put 1 cup of sugar instead of half. I however didn’t cook it long enough (it was in for 45 min), so it has come out like a half baked brownie, but it is still lovely! Next time I will probably let it cook for an hour. Thanks so much for sharing this.
you’re most welcome Mad! 🙂
I destroyed its vegan status by serving with creme fraiche and agave syrup. Delicious – thank you!
Welcome 🙂
HI,
Massive thanks for this recipe. as this is my third week without all sugars (to starve my yeast which I am intolerant to) and cant remember when I had a chocolate or any desert (I have a long list of food intolerance) I started climbing up the walls. And then I found this recipe. i had to change it a bit. I used coconut palm sugar, couldn’t use chocolate so added extra tablespoon of coconut palm sugar, 2 tablespoons of olive oil and 2 more tablespoon of cocoa. I also added handful of chopped roasted almonds. I baked it for extra 5 mins. Its LOVELY. I just had two pieces – and I don`t feel guilty. Take this leaky gut!
Sounds delish! Glad it worked for you 🙂
So glad I found this as we had dinner guests and had totally forgotten I had used up the wheat flour. Made these in little ramekins and used rapeseed instead of olive oil, and they were well received. Will definitely make again.
Yay !! Glad to hear
Thanks so much for this – I use gram flour (chickpea flour) a lot, but never knew it could be used as substitute for eggs. WHilst I have no allergies/intolerances, many people who I love do, and a colleague’s daughter is allergic to eggs, and doesn’t like cakes made with vinegar (the most common egg substitute). Hoping to be able to try this out and see if this might be something she’ll try!
Thank you so much for your kind words, please let me know how the cake turned out, and if you liked it.
So happy to have found this recipe. I’m going to try using orange infused olive oil and raw cacao and maple syrup as we try to eat clean. Might try with almond milk instead of water too. Not sure what the equivalent weights are for the American cups, but I’ll try to work it out.
Trial and error, that’s how we learn 🙂 Orange infused olive oil sounds so good! Let me know how the cake came out. Bon Apetite
I made this cake it came out really good to avoid flour taste in cake,slightly heat the flour in microwave like Luke warm let it cool down and start the process .heat the flour in the interval of 30 sec
wow- interesting intake, thank you !
Thank you so much! I’ve recently had to cut wheat and sugar and have eaten a series of pretty awful ‘alternative’ cakes – ranging from solid as concrete to powdery monstrosities. This recipe was absolutely brilliant made with xylitol. For me the sweetness was perfect and texture delicious. I can’t quite believe there’s a chocolate cake I can eat!
Im so happy to hear, Jo. Thanks for sharing!
I made this for the kids the other day and it was amazing. Great recipe, really easy to make. I put a handful of marshmallows in too. Deffo make again
So glad to hear this, Clair. Happy Spring
Great recipe, thank you! I halved the amounts and did it in a cupcake tin (it made six and one extra) and used some choc chips instead of melted chocolate and a bit of stevia. So yum 🙂
Glad you liked it 🙂
Sounds amazing – I am making gluten and dairy free supper for my church this week so will bake a double quantity of this recipe. Thanks 🙂
Good luck, hope church goers will like it 🙂
Hello Aylet
It went down very well. I made a double batch. I think it will be a regular offering now. Thanks for posting it.
Yay !!!
A really lovely cake! Thanks so much! I am gluten free and to find a cake that uses chickpea flour is a plus and my two daughters love it! We all love it! My husband said to try to find a receipe that uses chickpea flour since he makes the girls chickpea pancakes for breakfast (without them knowing chickpea flour) anyway this is really tasty and I use runny honey instead of sugar and it makes it more moist. Thank you for sharing this receipe!
So glad to hear, and thanks for the comment. Stay safe and take care!