Vegan Twix Cake
I love my husband, he’s always looking to challenge me and test my skills. Which is exactly why I should have known better than to ask him what kind of cake he would want for his birthday. But I did, and he requested a Twix Cake.
Now if you’ve been following me for a while now, you’d know that we’re vegan. Vegan Twix is unfortunately not a thing, as much as I wish it was. So to create an entire cake inspired by the famous chocolate bar seemed like a hefty ask.
But I’m not one to back down from a challenge, I knew it would just take some extra time and patience but I could do it. I took my time with this cake as I didn’t want to overwhelm myself.
Day 1: I made the cookies and the cakes
Day 2: I made the caramel and the buttercream
Day 3: I assembled the cake.
If you’re feeling extra motivated, you could definitely do this all in a single day. It would just take you all day. I highly recommend taking your time with this one though. Dividing it up into 3 days allowed me to take my time and have a lot of patience with it.
I wouldn’t have been able to create this masterpiece if it weren’t for the many food bloggers out there. I used a total of 4 different recipes to bring this cake to life. But rather than sending you on a wild goose chase, I thought I’d help compile it all in one space for any amateur bakers looking to level up a bit! I go into further detail below about how I used each recipe but I thought it would be nice to compile them all here as well:
Twix Cake Design & Inspiration by: Baking with Blondie
Chocolate Cake & Buttercream Frosting by: It Doesn’t Taste Like Chicken
Twix Cookie (used for the crumb bottom) by: what Megan’s making
Vegan Caramel Sauce by: Six Vegan Sisters
The Inspiration
Firstly I need to speak to the inspiration. As much as I’d love to take credit for the design and thought behind this cake, I didn’t. The fabulous @bakingwithblondie / bakingwithblondie.com did. I loved how she brought the cookie bottom of the Twix inside the cake and layered it with caramel to truly give you that Twix layering you’re looking for. I would have loved to add Twix’s on top of the cake like she had but as I said vegan Twix isn’t a thing (yet!)
Chocolate Cake
Once finding my inspiration it was time to find recipes for all the layers. My go-to chocolate cake recipe is by @itdoesnttastelikechicken / itdoesnttastelikechicken.com. It is one of the best chocolate cake recipes I’ve ever made/had. I’ve gotten so so many compliments on my cake when I’ve used her recipe, and bonus, it’s 100% vegan.
Twix Cookie Crumb Bottom/Layer
For the cookie crumble bottom I had a recipe in mind but knew I was going to have to make some small adjustments to veganise it. @whatmegansmaking was my go-to blog for my all time favourite cookie, homemade Twix cookies. I hadn’t made them since going vegan though. Her recipe is extremely easy with only 5 ingredients and the only ingredient that needs to be swapped with a vegan substitute is the butter. They are so delicious, airy and full of flavour.
Caramel
The most intimidating of it all was the caramel. Caramel actually isn’t that hard to make but for whatever reason I fear it as an amateur baker. I’ve successfully made caramel from scratch once before and again, this was before going vegan. After a few Pinterest searches, I came across one of my favourite vegan blogs out there @sixvegansisters caramel recipe. I had to double up on it for this cake but found the recipe extremely straightforward. The caramel was deemed “some of the best I’ve ever had” by my husband and multiple friends.
The Frosting
Finally, there is the buttercream. It didn’t turn out quite like a had imagined but still was so so delicious. I used the chocolate buttercream recipe by @itdoesnttastelikechicken that accompanies her chocolate cake but made a few adjustments. In the recipe by Baking With Blondie, she incorporates some cookie that has been put in the food processor until its quite fine. So I substituted the chocolate powder for the cookie powder. She also adds in caramel flavour. I tried to find caramel flavour at my local grocery store but they didn’t carry it so I thought it would have been okay if I just added in some real caramel. I came to realize that she probably uses the caramel flavour over real caramel because I just couldn’t get a strong enough flavour. Initially when I added in the processed cookies, it made the frosting kind of grainy. This solved itself as I had made the buttercream a few days before we ate the cake. This allowed time for the cookie to soften which helped the texture of the buttercream. But I never got any flavour from the cookie. So really my buttercream just turned out to be a classic vanilla buttercream, which was totally fine. I may try to tweak that recipe in the future but I’m not sure as it still was so damn good.
Building the Cake
When it comes to putting the cake together it was pretty simple, the hardest part was doing the caramel drip on top as the caramel cooled very quickly.
Once you have all your components made, you want to start with the bottom layer of the cake. I recommend using a cake decorating turn table, as it really helps add some ease to the decorating process. Placing the cake side down and cookie side up. Scoop some frosting onto the cake and spread. You want to outline a circle about two inches in diameter in the centre creating a nice supportive wall for the caramel that will go into the centre. You want to pour about 1/2 cup of caramel in the centre. Repeat for each layer until you get to the last one. For the last layer do a crumb coat and place in the fridge for 5-10 minutes.
Once the crumb coat has set, it’s time to do the caramel drip. I had never done a drip cake before so I decided to watch a couple videos on how to do it. I used a sauce squeeze bottle with hole that’s not too big, but you can also use a piping bag as well. Once I filled it with the caramel, I started to squeeze a small amount on the top, flat surface of the cake, but on the edge just as if you were doing small dots around the circumference of the cake.
Baking with Blondie also shared a quick video of how she decorated the cake which helped me figure out how I would accomplish the drip. I highly recommend you give it a watch (don’t worry its only 15 seconds long) you can watch it here.
Vegan Twix Cake
Equipment
- 3 9" cake pans
- Food processor
- Stand mixer
- food scale
Ingredients
It Doesn't Taste Like Chicken Vegan Chocolate Cake
Dry ingredients
- 3.75 cups all-purpose flour
- 3.75 cups white sugar
- 1.5 cups cocoa powder
- 1.5 tsp baking powder
- 0.75 tsp baking soda
- 1.5 tsp salt
Wet ingredients
- 4 cups non dairy milk
- 1 cup light oil
- 3 tbsp apple cider vinegar
- 1.5 tbsp vanilla extract
Buttercream Frosting
- 0.75 cup vegan butter I like to use vegan Becel bricks of butter
- 0.75 cup vegetable shortening can use more vegan butter but will need to keep frosting refrigerated
- 1.88 cup powdered sugar
- 0.38 cup finely processed twix cookie crumbs
- 1.5 tsp vanilla extract
- 2 tbsp caramel sauce or 1.5 tsp caramel flavour
- 1.5-3 tbsp non dairy milk
What Megan's Making Twix Cookie Layer
- 1½ cup vegan butter again, using the brick is best
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 3 cup all-purpose flour
- ¾ tsp salt
- +7 tbsp butter this won't be used in the baking process of the cookies, but instead for making the cookie crumble once the cookies are baked.
Six Vegan Sisters Caramel Sauce (doubled)
- 1 cup sugar
- 1/2 cup vegan butter brick
- 4 tbsp non-dairy creamer I like to use Silk's oat creamer
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 2 tsp vanilla
Instructions
Twix Cookie Layer
- Preheat oven to 350F. Prepare your cookie sheets by lining with parchment paper.
- In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar, once combined mix in the vanilla and salt and then slowly add in the flour until everything is well incorporated.
- On a lightly floured surface, roll our your dough until its about a 1/2 inch thick and with a circular cookie cutter, begin to cut out cookies. For this recipe, it doesn't matter what size you make them as your not using the cookies in their cookie form.
- Bake for 14-16 minutes or until the cookies are lightly browned on the bottom. Set aside to cool.
- Once the cookies are cooled you want to create your cookie crumble by food processing them. Add about 18 oz of cookies to your food processor (its hard to give a number of cookies as everyones will be a different size and weight) and your 7 tbsp of butter to a food processor and pulse until it has turned into a crumble.
The Cake
- Prepare 3 8" round cake pans by lightly greasing and flouring them. Set aside.
- In a large bowl mix together all of your dry ingredients then set aside.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together all the wet ingredients. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix. Be sure to not over mix, just whisking until just combined.
- Evenly dividing your cookie crumble between the 3 cake pans, press down to make a crust. You should want the crust to be about an inch thick or so. Then in each pan divide the batter on top of the cookie crumble bottom.
- Bake for 40 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Set aside to cool.
Caramel
- Place sugar in a saucepan over low-mediu heat. Stir often. The sugar will begin to clump (almost looks like rock candy) and then will start to melt. Continue to stir until completely melted.
- Remove from heat and add in the butter, whisking until combined. Then add in the creamer, ensuring its fully mixed in as well.
- Place back onto the low-medium heat until it starts to buble. Stir for about another minute then remove from heat and mix in your salt and vanilla.
- Once mixed, strain your caramel to get out any inpurities and set aside.
Buttercream Frosting
- Using a mixer, blend all of your buttercream ingredients together except for the plant based milk until its whipped up. Only add your plant milk 1 tbsp at a time if your frosting is too thick.
- Set in fridge until its time to use.
Assembly
- If stacking a layered cake, using a cake turntable, add on a touch of buttercream to act as glue, then place a carboard cake round, then place your first cake layer on that, cookie side up.
- Add some buttercream, spreading it around the cake, creating a dam in the centre of the cake (this is what will hold your caramel in place). You want your frosting to be thicker on the outside of the cake and thin in the centre where the caramel will go. Place the next cake round on top, cookie side up and repeat with the remaining layers.
- Crumb coat the cake, then place in teh freezer for 5 minutes to set. Once set, add your caramel drip and then place in the freezer once more for 5 minutes to set.
- Once the drip has set, you can add more caramel to completely cover the top layer of the cake, or just pipe some buttercream around to cover the top of the drips. Use your creativity here! And then enjoy!