Abbey Sharp teams up again with Davida from The Healthy Maven channel in celebration of the July 4th holiday to bring you two vegan dessert recipes that are not only fun to make but delicious as well.
Abbey has chosen to make a mouth watering vegan Watermelon Cake featuring a variety of fresh berries, coconut, and even almonds. To get started with her recipe the first thing you need to do is go out and find yourself a great watermelon. Since the watermelon is the star of the show in this recipe your selection is going to be crucial.
While there are no doubt some of you that know how to pick out a good watermelon many of you will probably just grab the best looking one in the bin. You want to look for a watermelon with a yellow or somewhat cream colored patch on either side of it. This patch is tell tale sign that the watermelon was given time to ripen on the vine, this is what will give you the best flavor. Also be sure the watermelon has firm, smooth skin and an overall uniform shape. If it meets the first two requirements knock on it make sure it has a deep hollow sound, the deep hollow sound indicates a properly ripened melon.
Once you have selected the ideal watermelon slice off the ends and stand it up on the cutting board vertically. After than simply cut the extra off the sides until you get your watermelon into a nice circular shape, much like a regular cake would look if it was extra tall. At this point put your rounded off watermelon onto the dish you intend to serve it from as our next step is icing it. In order to ice it however you will need to create your vegan icing.
To create the vegan icing for your watermelon cake add coconut yogurt to a small mixing bowl then add in some unsweetened coconut and mix these together well. The unsweetened coconut is great binder that will give your icing not only a good texture but a great flavor as well. Now that you’ve got your vegan icing created it’s time to ice your watermelon. Start with a thin layer on top and just work your way around the watermelon icing it evenly. It is important to remember to keep your icing thin, if you put it on too thick it’s going to start to clump up and in the words of Abbey look “gloppy”. You want to avoid that if at all possible.
Now you have a good sized white cylindrical watermelon cake that needs to be decorated. This might be a good time to bring the kids in to lend a hand. Abbey and the Davida start off with blueberries forming a ring, or crown around the very top. Since this is a 4th of July vegan dessert recipe they are decorating in red, white, and blue. Next you will get some fresh strawberries, which are in season this time of year, and make a ring with them as well within the blueberry crown.
Inside of the ring of strawberries you just made add in some raspberries to completely fill out the top of the cake. Also use the raspberries to make a ring of red around the bottom. Above the layer of raspberries on the bottom stick a layer of thin sliced bananas right onto the side of cake. After that take some of the leftover coconut from making your icing and just throw pinches of it all around the outside of cake, it will stick right on as soon as it hits. Finally add some sliced almonds at random to the side of the cake, sticking them on as well, and voila. You now have a fantastic looking 4th of July themed vegan dessert that any watermelon fan would love to eat.
Be sure to check out Davida’s recipe for Vegan Berry Coconut Parfaits on her Healthy Maven channel as well for more 4th of July vegan dessert goodness.
For more tips on staying healthy, recipes, dieting, and information fit for consumption by foodies everywhere stop by Abbey’s blog.
Also don’t forget to subscribe to the channel for regular content full of new and interesting recipes.
Watch Davida’s video here! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-HW_Q6GXZ7I
source
