This vegan Rhubarb Ginger Upside-Down Cake will tickle your tastebuds — and your appetite for dessert — with the tangy-sweet rhubarb and spicy-sweet candied ginger.
I could not let Spring get away without baking up at least one rhubarb treat.
I usually tend to bake rhubarb into a pie — and we love rhubarb pie in our home — but there are so many different things you can do with this lip-puckeringly sour stalk that magically transforms during baking into soft, subtly tart sweetness.
This vegan Rhubarb Ginger Upside-Down Cake is exactly what I needed.
As they bake up, the juices of the ruby-red rhubarb and the sugar caramelize into a thick, gooey syrup that glazes the top the moist, voluptuous cake and flows down its sides.
You really don’t have to worry about decorating this cake because it’s so pretty to look at right out of the pan– as indeed any upside down cake is. But the gorgeous color of the rhubarb, I think, makes this cake even more special.
It is rather important that you bake this cake in a springform pan, because that just makes it so much easier to unmold without messing up the glossy, exquisite top. If some pieces of rhubarb come off, just put them back on — no one will be able to tell the difference.
Now, the recipe for my Vegan Rhubarb Ginger Upside-Down Cake.
Vegan Rhubarb Ginger Upside-Down Cake
Ingredients
- 2 2/3 cup all-purpose flour or cake flour (if using all-purpose, you can substitute 2 tbsp of flour for 2 tbsp of cornstarch for a more tender crumb). You can make this a whole wheat cake by using whole-wheat pastry flour or half all-purpose and half whole-wheat.
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1/4 tsp sea salt
- 1 1/2 cups sugar
- 2 sticks vegan butter at room temperature
- 1 3/4 cup nondairy milk
- 2 tsp apple cider vinegar
- 2 tsp pure vanilla extract
For the rhubarb topping
- 4 cups (about 4-5 stalks) rhubarb, chopped into cubes of about 1 cm each
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 3 tsp cornstarch
- 1/4 cup candied ginger, chopped
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.
- In a bowl, mix the chopped rhubarb, candied ginger, brown sugar and corn starch and set aside.
- Mix the milk and vinegar and set aside to curdle for a couple of minutes.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer or a large bowl, using the whisk attachment or a regular whisk, cream together the butter and the sugar until soft and fluffy, about two minutes.
- Add the milk-vinegar mixture, sugar, and vanilla extract and mix well.
- In another bowl, mix the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
- Add the flour mixture to the wet ingredients in three batches, mixing for about 20 seconds after each add, and scraping down the sides and bottom of the bowl with a spatula to ensure even mixing.
- Prepare a 10-inch springform pan by greasing the bottom and sides with oil or vegan butter. Cover the bottom with parchment paper which will make for much easier unmolding. Place the springform pan on a cookie sheet for easier transfer and to catch any juices from the rhubarb that may leak out as the cake bakes.
- Pour all of the rhubarb in the bottom and spread evenly.
- Pour the cake batter on top of the rhubarb and spread evenly. Smooth the top.
- Bake for 60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
- Let the cake cool in the pan for 15 minutes. Then invert a dish or a cake stand over the cake pan and carefully but quickly flip the cake. It is important to unmold the cake while it is still warm otherwise the juices will start sticking to the pan.
- Open the springform pan and remove. Carefully lift off the bottom and the parchment paper.
- Garnish, if you like, with more strips of candied ginger. Et voila!
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Let them eat cake:
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Yum I’ll have to try this! We have a ginourmous stash of rhubarb in the fridge just waiting to be eaten.
Thanks, Tiffany, a stash of rhubarb– I’m jealous! 🙂 Hope you try the cake!
Thanks a lot for sharing this recipe! I made it yesterday for a Mother’s Day celebration and followed your recipe meticulously, but the batter needed almost twice as long in the oven and was still a bit gooey in the middle after taking it out. Do you have an idea what I might have done wrong?
The taste of the cake was superb nevertheless, by the way! 😊
Hi Helen, thanks for the feedback. I am surprised about the increased bake time– I have made this basic cake many times over the years, with different fruit, and it has always worked for me. The only possibility I can think of is that your oven may not be heating up accurately. Next time try raising the temperature to 350 degrees.
I had the same problem. The cake has now been in almost an hour and a half and it is still soft in the middle.
This cake looks amazing, Vaishali. I love those beautiful colors of the rhubarb. It’s a little late now for the season, but I am going to find some rhubarb just so I can make this.
How much is a stick of butter in weight please? I’m over here so might be different to US thanks 🙂
This cake is amazing! I’ve made it for my mum and my parents in law and they all think it’s gorgeous! If there are cookbooks in heaven, this recipe must have dropped out of one! 😉 Thank you so much. If only rhubarb was easier to find here in Russia (we only get it in one shop nearby on Tuesdays in the summer or something)
Hello, This recipe looks fabulous! I am wondering how much 2 sticks of vegan butter is. I can’t find vegan butter in my area but vegan margarine. How many cups (or grams) would 2 sticks of vegan butter be please?
Thanks,
Jennifer ~:o)
One cup!
Is there really one and there quarter cups of milk in this? That sounds a lot.
My cake also turned out very gooey. I left it in for 15min extra and it was still extremely gooey in the middle. Maybe worth putting in less of the milk. It was tasty though and would probably have been lovely if I’d gone with my instinct and put in less batter or made it less wet!