This juicy, delicious, utterly lemony Vegan Lemon Poppy Seed Bundt Cake will make you fall in love. On top goes a scrumptious lemon glaze.
A plump, golden Lemon Poppy Seed Cake with a Lemon Glaze is what I have for you today.
After all these years of baking vegan cakes and cupcakes, I am still amazed at how easy it is to eliminate animal products like butter, cream and egg and still get a perfectly moist, airy and beautiful result. All of it minus that awful egg odor. If you don't believe me, all you have to do is try this cake.
Lemon and poppy seed are a classic combination, and just one bite of this amazing cake will tell you why. I used Meyer lemons which have a distinctive flavor and are sweeter than your average lemon, but it's perfectly fine to use regular lemons instead. You could even try substituting other fruit juices.
This is a great base recipe to create cakes of all flavors. You could, for instance, substitute the lemon juice and zest with orange and get a great orange bundt cake. Or you might try another fruit juice. This cake is very much like a pound cake, with a buttery crumb and a melt-in-the-mouth texture. I also used unbleached cake flour to get a particularly light texture. Cake flour is very low in gluten, so you don't have to worry about your cake getting tough, the way it could with higher gluten flours like all-purpose flour. If you can't get cake flour, use all-purpose but replace two tablespoons in each cup with cornflour.
You could also use whole-wheat pastry flour to make this cake. It will be darker and the crumb will be thicker, but you'd still have a great cake (and one that's slightly healthier too).
Gotta run now, but here's the recipe for my vegan Lemon Poppy Seed Cake. Enjoy!
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Vegan Lemon Poppy Seed Cake With A Lemon Glaze
Ingredients
For Lemon Poppyseed Bundt Cake
- 2 ⅔ cup cake flour (If you don't have cake flour, all-purpose would be okay but replace 5 tablespoon of the all-purpose flour with cornstarch. You can also make this with whole-wheat pastry flour but the crumb will be thicker.)
- 2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 1 ½ cups vegan cane sugar (or turbinado sugar)
- 1 ¾ cup almond milk (or any nondairy milk)
- 2 teaspoon vinegar
- ¼ cup lemon juice (from freshly squeezed lemons)
- ¼ cup poppy seeds (lightly toasted in a skillet. Do this over medium heat and stir frequently. It should take no more than five minutes.)
- Zest of two lemons
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 1 cup vegan butter (2 sticks. Butter should be at room temperature)
For the lemon glaze
- ¼ cup lemon juice
- ¾ cup powdered sugar
Instructions
Make the lemon poppyseed bundt cake
- Whisk the nondairy milk and vinegar and set aside for five minutes.
- Cream together the sugar and "butter" in a stand mixer or hand mixer fitted with a wisk, until light and fluffy, about 2-3 minutes. Stop the mixer and scrape down the bottom and sides of bowl a couple of times during the mixing.
- Mix the lemon juice, zest, vanilla extract and milk-vinegar mixture.
- Sift into a bowl the flour, salt, baking soda, and baking powder
- Add the flour to the butter and sugar mixture in three batches, alternating with the almond milk mixture. Mix for 20 seconds after each addition, then scrape down the sides of the bowl to ensure everything's integrated.
- Add the poppy seeds and mix with a spatula to disperse them evenly through the batter.
- Oil and flour a bundt cake pan. Pour the cake batter into the pan and bake in a preheated 350-degree oven for 45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the cake comes out dry. Let the cake stand in the bundt pan on a rack for 10 minutes, then unmold. This cake unmolds easily, but if you need help run a knife lightly and carefully around the edges.
Make the lemon glaze
- With a wisk, mix the lemon juice and sugar.
- With a toothpick, make a few holes in the warm cake and then paint the glaze onto the cake using a pastry brush. You can even just pour it on. Add some lemon zest on top, if desired.
Heidi Wise
I don't often write recipe reviews, but I HAD to take the time to sing the praises of this incredible cake! Melt-in-your-mouth goodness. Even my husband, who doesn't like cake, ate two pieces in one sitting. The whole cake disappeared in two days. I couldn't wait to make it again, and I'll be making it regularly. Thank you!
Vaishali
Heidi, I am so happy to hear that! Thanks for leaving a review. 🙂
BARBARA -San Diego
Thank you Vaishali for another great dessert. My guests and friends loved this and none of them are vegans. I chose to omit the poppy seeds and double the amount of rind for a very lemony version of the cake. All of your cakes are great. I know I can reliably bake any of your deserts and they will be a crowd pleaser.
Vaishali
Thanks, Barbara, that's lovely to hear.
dk
unsure if corn flour is meant to be corn starch...i believe in the UK they're interchangeable, but not in north america. corn flour is uncommon, whereas starch is in every kitchen...
Vaishali
It’s the same as cornstarch.
Rachel
My husband and I made this cake yesterday and it was a huge success. We subbed half a cup stevia for half a cup of the sugar and we only used about half the poppy seeds. This cake was everything I hoped for. Just amazing!
Vaishali
So happy to hear!
lisa
I like the cake!
lisa
I like the cake! -written by a young cake lover.
Vaishali
Awesome! 🙂
Cheryl
I made this cake last Christmas and it was a complete hit!
Thanks for sharing 🙂
Vaishali
So happy to hear, Cheryl.
Person who bakes a lot
Wow lemon pound cake is my favorite will be making as soon as I get cake flour!
narf77
My husband made me this cake for my birthday recently. He subbed out the lemon and added in orange and it was the best cake I have ever eaten (and I was a cook for a number of years). I loved it so much I took it to an omni dinner party (minus the poppy seeds) and it went down amazingly well and everyone wanted the recipe. I then took it to another level and turned it into a matcha, black sesame seed and rose scented drizzle cake that I blogged about. I linked to your recipe and hope that you don't mind me sharing the amended recipe with my dear constant readers. I am now following your wonderful blog (in my RSS Feed Reader) after that chance search on Google for a "Vegan drizzle cake" by my wonderful husband. Your blog is amazing and I am SO glad that we found it 🙂 I want to give this recipe 10 stars because it is amazing, light and fluffy, moist, completely delicious and eminently customisable. I have made it three times now and it was a glowing success every single time 🙂
Vaishali Honawar
Hi Narf77, THank you for your very kind words. And your matcha rose drizzle cake sounds beyond sublime! I would love a slice of that! I am glad too that your husband found the blog and tried the lemon cake recipe. Wonderful to "meet" you. 🙂
Lanette
Hello, what would you say about using oat flour. Would you think it will come out alright?
Vaishali
Don't use oat flour by itself-- it doesn't have enough gluten to bind. You could mix in some with whole-wheat, or, if you want gluten-free, use a gluten-free cake flour mix.
Helen Hulbert
I would have loved to try this recipe, but it doesn't say how much fat or saturated fats, my husband must watch his cholesterol so I need this information. Helen
Vaishali
Hi Helen, Some of my old recipes don't have nutrition info but you can always plug the ingredients into the recipe analyzer at Calorie Count for nutrition information that's fairly accurate. I went ahead and did this for this recipe and if you slice this cake into 20 pieces, each slice would be 259 calories and would have 14.8 grams of fat, approximately half of which would be saturated fat. Vegan products do not contain cholesterol.
Vaishali Honawar
Hi Tibik, yes, a springform pan would work just fine. And black poppy seeds would be okay-- only thing is they'd show up in the cake so I am not sure how aesthetically pleasing that would be. But flavor-wise they wouldn't make much of a difference.
A very happy birthday to your son!
Tibik
Hello Vaishali,
I am planning to make this for my son's birhtday, but I don't have a bundt pan. Do you think I could use a 9 inch spring form pan? And can I use black poppy seeds instead of the white?
Thank you for sharing and for the effort you put into your recipes.
Vaishali
Priya, Zengirl, Thanks!
Maesti, this recipe would work great for pound cake. Leave out the lemon juice, poppy seeds and zest and replace the lemon juice with an equal amount of almond milk. You could even try using some club soda in place of the lemon juice for an airier cake.
maesti
I need a plain pound type cake for a trifle. Can I just leave out the lemon juice and zest? Would I need more milk? Can I bake it in a loaf pan??
Many thanks
Zengirl @ Heart and Mind
Vaishali,
Looks Yummy! I am not such a sweet person, but your blog makes me eat sweet dish and eggplant dishes! Not to mention, zenguy has similar tastes,
Preeti
Priya
Cake looks absolutely super spongy and fabulous.
Vaishali
Divya, thanks.
Nisha, my only inspiration from the start has been Desi, who has a huge sweet tooth. 🙂 But as a novice baker, I learned a lot from a classic American cookbook named Joy of Cooking which has dozens of recipes for baked goods (usually not vegan), and just from watching baking shows on public television. By the time I turned vegan, I knew enough about baking to experiment on my own.
Anonymous
Hi Vaishali,
Lovely and delicious looking cake. Since I do not have the bundt pan, can I use the regular 8" or 9" cake tin? One question which had been lingering in mind since the time I have started visiting ur blog; what is ur inspiration (other than inner instinct)to baking? Is there any book or site?
God Bless
Nisha.
divya
looks absolutely divine..yum
Vaishali
Barbie, I too hate those funky ingredients that sometimes crop up in vegan baked goods. 🙂 Yes, the almond milk should be unsweetened, although using sweetened almond milk would not make a difference that would be discernible in the final cake.
Barbie
Should the almond milk be unsweetened? This just may be my first foray into vegan baking...and all because it doesn't use lots of funky ingredients!!
Vaishali
Manasi, sorry, I didn't respond to your question. Yes, you can use vegetable oil. Use a flavorless oil, like canola.
Vaishali
Manju, thanks!
Manasi, I don't want to generalize, but I do want to shed some light on your view-- one others may hold too-- that the Amish treat animals with love and care because they lead a peaceful lifestyle. The Amish dominate the puppy mill trade-- those horrible places where dogs are kept locked in cages all their lives (often stacked one on top of another) and bred incessantly to create puppies sold to pet shops. Lancaster county in Pennsylvania, home to the Amish, has become known as the puppy mill capital of the United States. The Amish have also often enough been implicated in horrible instances of cruelty against the horses who pull their buggies. Here's just one news article from earlier this month that you might want to read:
Manasi
Oh wow! I must try this. Can I use oil instead of vegan butter?
I am against horse carriages too, but I did take one just a few months ago in a Amish village, but i did note that the animals are so well cared for by these simple folk.
Manju
that looks simply gorgeous!