Vegan Cherry-Berry Bundt Cake with a Lemon Glaze

I'm over cupcakes. My new love is Bundt cake. I love making a single cake and topping with a simple glaze. It's easy, and it lets the cake be the star, not the icing.

At Christmas, I made a veganized version of this apple-cream cheese cake, and a couple of months later, I made an adapted version of this vegan lemon cake. This week, I had cherries and blueberries left over from sangria, and I wanted to use them up in something sweet. We're about to head out of town, so I need to be able to freeze most of it for our return. That's something else I love Bundt cake for - it's easy to freeze half for another week.

By the way, when I make a conventional cake recipe into a vegan one, my favorite egg replacer is golden flax seed meal and water*, as it makes cakes really moist with a nice crumb. Anytime a cake has an acid ingredient, like vinegar or citrus juice, and baking soda instead of baking powder, it seems to rise nicely and have a great texture, too, so that's something else I look for. I also like to replace half the butter with apple sauce and the rest with canola oil, if the recipe isn't written that way already.

*To replace one egg, use 1 tablespoon golden flax seed meal or ground flax seed and 3 tablespoons water. For 2 eggs, use 2 tablespoons flax meal and 1/3 cup water, for 3 eggs, 3 tablespoons flax meal and a half cup of water. Cream the flax seed meal and water with the oil, applesauce and sugar. Easy!

I'm sending this to Weekend Herb Blogging, created by Kalyn of Kalyn’s Kitchen, now run by Haalo of Cook (Almost) Anything, and hosted this week by Elena of Zibaldone Culinario. 

Vegan Cherry-Berry Bundt Cake with a Lemon Glaze 

I used cherries and blueberries, but I can imagine this with all kinds of berries. Stem and pit cherries. Stem strawberries and cut the larger ones in half. Use other berries whole.

For the lemons, zest two lemons and juice three before you start, so that you have enough for both the cake and the glaze. 

For the cake: 
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons golden flax seed meal
1/2 cup water
1-1/2 cups granulated sugar
3/4 cup canola oil
3/4 cup apple sauce
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Zest of 1 lemon
3 tablespoons lemon juice (from about 2 lemons)
2-1/2 cups mixed cherries and blueberries (see headnote) 

For the glaze: 
2 tablespoons margarine or coconut oil
2 tablespoons lemon juice (from about 1 lemon)
1 cup powdered sugar
Zest of 1 lemon 

To make the cake:
Oil a Bundt pan. (Don't flour it.) Preheat oven to 350 F.

Fluff the flour in the container with a spoon before measuring. Combine the flour, baking soda, and salt in a small bowl.

In a large bowl, cream the golden flax seed meal, water, sugar, canola oil, and apple sauce with an electric mixer on medium. Add the vanilla. Turn the speed down to low and add the flour mixture one heaping spoonful at a time. When the flour is almost combined, stop the mixer and finish stirring in the flour by hand. Add the cherries and berries and stir in. Pour the mixture into the Bundt pan and spread out the top with the back of a spoon.

Bake for 50 minutes to 1 hour, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Let cool for 15 minutes on a wire rack, then turn out onto the rack and let cool for 2 hours. 

To make the glaze: 
In a small saucepan, combine margarine and lemon juice and cook over low heat until margarine melts. Add powdered sugar and lemon zest. Whisk until smooth, about 5 minutes. Drizzle over cake immediately.