Since I posted my recipe for easy vegan fairy cakes I’ve had lots of requests from readers for a large dairy and egg free sponge cake recipe, so here it is.
This easy sponge cake is great for birthdays and celebrations and it is absolutely essential for an English afternoon tea. I filled this one with raspberry jam for a simple garden picnic. If you want the full Vegan Victoria Sponge experience a batch of my simple vegan buttercream should tick all your cakey boxes.
My Vegan Baking Journey
Much of my life as a Mum has been spent baking with and for my children and my recipes are like old friends. I bake brownies for birthdays, cupcakes for treats and biscuits for after school pick me ups.
Sitting with a muffin and offloading all the stuff from their school days, or handing them a flapjack as they flew back out to see friends, has been an essential part of our family tapestry.
Consequently, since I made the leap from vegetarian to vegan, I’ve spent a lot of time in my kitchen adapting old recipes. It is important to me to keep the flavours and textures of their childhood while removing eggs and dairy. Most important of all, they must be simple and quick to rustle up!
The Simplest Recipes Are Always The Best
This recipe is the one I use most, it is quick, contains nothing which is difficult to get hold of and can be adapted according to season, occasion or taste. For more information on the mechanics of dairy and egg free cakes check out my earlier post How To Make Dairy Free Cupcakes.
This vegan cake mix uses sunflower oil in place of butter and utilises the magical chemical reaction between apple cider vinegar and bicarbonate of soda for that fluffy rise. I do love a bit of wizardry!
What Do You Need To Make A Vegan Sponge Cake?
9 simple ingredients are all that are needed here – no egg replacement powder or ground flax seeds and nothing you can’t buy in your local supermarket. All you need is:
- Self Raising Flour
- Sunflower or Rapeseed Oil (or any other lightly flavoured vegetable oil)
- Soya Milk
- Cider Vinegar
- Baking Powder
- Bicarbonate of Soda
- Caster Sugar
- Vanilla Extract
- a pinch of salt
How To Make Vegan Cake
If you haven’t tried vegan baking before all the magic happens with that little bit of cider vinegar. You won’t taste it in the final cake, it is there just to turn soya milk into vegan buttermilk and then to react with baking powder and bicarb when it all goes in the oven! My top tips would be:
- DON’T replace the cider vinegar with malt vinegar or you cake will taste like a chip shop!
- DO get your cake in the oven as soon as you have combined all the ingredients and poured it into the tins. You want all that fizzy reaction to take place in the oven for the best result.
Vegan Sponge Cake Fillings and Toppings
My offspring are not big fans of cream filled and icing topped cakes so I save those for treats for myself or to share with friends.
This cake is at its simplest as I’ve shown it here, filled with jam and sprinkled with icing sugar.
If you want to ring the changes you can also try:
- Topping and filling it with vegan buttercream (add a little cocoa to the cream for a chocolatey treat)
- Filling and topping it with fresh fruit – try strawberries, raspberries or blueberries
- Covering it with chocolate fudge icing
Serve it simply with a cup of tea in front of a fire in winter or with a glass of fizz and a dollop of sunshine in summer!
Have you been admiring my lovely blanket? Isn’t it gorgeous?! We have had the sad task of clearing out Mr TS’s childhood family home. I miss my mother in law with all my heart but seeing her blanket, flapping on my washing line, brings her close. I love it and its stained glass beauty.
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Easy Vegan Sponge Cake
Ingredients
- 400 ml soya milk
- 40 ml cider vinegar
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
- 400 g self raising flour
- 200 g caster sugar
- 150 ml sunflower oil
- 4 tsp vanilla extract
- pinch of salt
Filling and Topping
- 200 g raspberry jam
- 2 tbsp icing sugar
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180C/350F
- Lightly grease and base line two 20 cm/8 inch sandwich tins.
- Add the cider vinegar to the soya milk and leave to stand for 10 minutes or until curdled.
- Sift the flour, baking powder, bicarb and salt into a mixing bowl.
- Stir in the sugar.
- Pour in the oil, the milk and vinegar mixture and the vanilla extract. Stir until you have a smooth batter.
- Pour the batter into your prepared tins.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 25 - 30 mins until risen, firm to the touch, just beginning to pull away from the sides of the tin and a skewer inserted into the cakes comes out clean.
- Cool in the tins for 5 minutes, then turn out onto wire cooling racks and allow to cool completely.
- Spread jam, generously over one cake then place the other cake on top. Dust lightly with icing sugar and serve.
Hi Chris,
I look forward to trying this later, for my weekend cake fix!
Is the vanilla whisked into the oil, like in your Lemon Cupcakes? X
Hi Charlotte, yes it is! I’ll amend the recipe to make that clear, thank you 🙂 x
HI JUST USED YOUR EASY VEGAN SPONGE MIXE,BRILLANT THANKS SO MUCH GRANDAUGHTERS 18 th b.day and she will be over the moon it’s VEGAN..CHEERS!!
Can I use lemon juice instead of apple cider vinegar?
Hello, it looks very good, but unfortunately I do not have self raising flour. 🙁 Can I still make it?
Thank you!
Hi Brooklyn, yes you can! Just add 2 teaspoons of baking powder for each 150g/6oz/1 cup plain or all purpose flour. Hope that helps! 🙂
Love this recipe! Can the sponges be frozen some cooked?
Hi Rebecca – I think you must mean ‘once cooked’? I haven’t frozen this particular recipe – cake never lasts long enough here to make it to the freezer – but I think they’d be absolutely fine, definitely worth a go!
Wow this the best vegan cake recipe I have found!!
Oh thank you so much! I’m delighted you like it!
Could oat milk be used instead of soya milk? Looks like a great recipe!
I haven’t tried this one with oat milk but I have used it in other cakes and I’m pretty confident it will work here. Let me know how you get on!
Hi, can I make this using Gluten free flour? Would you add xanthum gun as well? Thanks
Hi Jo, I haven’t tried I’m afraid but I would think it is definitely worth a go!
To make a larger cake is it as easy as doubling up the ingredients, I need to make a 12″ square cake
I have doubled the ingredients to make a larger cake with no problem.
Does this cake hold up to being covered in sugar paste? And would you use your vegan buttercream recipe to fill and crumb coat it if it does? Thanks ?
I haven’t tried covering it in sugar paste but I think it is worth trying! I would brush it gently with a little melted apricot conserve first. I have filled it with my buttercream and that very definitely works very well indeed! I hope that helps.
Do you think I could add lemon to this successfully?
Absolutely. Use lemon juice instead of cider vinegar in the milk, it will do the same job, and grate the zest of 1 or 2 lemons into the cake mixture.
My second attempt at vegan sponge and this was an excellent recipe. It’s to make a fondant covered birthday cake so have high hopes now. Thank you!
That’s lovely to hear, hooray!
Made the vegan sponge cake using oat milk because that’s what I had – it was a last minute idea – and it worked so well. Sandwiched it with a smear of vegan buttercream, raspberries and jam and it all disappeared. People are badgering me for the recipe already. Will share. Many thanks.
I confess, I’m not vegan but can only seem to make cakes rise if they are vegan! Your recipe was no exception. I even made a pineapple upside down cake with the sponge recipe & it was the lightest, fluffiest I’ve made. Thank you.
Hi, could this be made with oat milk instead of soya? Thank you????
Yes it can. I only use soya, almond or oat milk for baking as I find they give the best results.
Made this into a square cake with glace icing and cherries on top – I have been baking for over 50 years and will not bother using a traditional sponge recipe again. Seriously the BEST sponge I have ever baked
Oh my god I love you !!!! I’ve tried 4 different recipes over the past 2 days from “professional” bakers and all of them were falling apart. Yours came out perfect and handles so well. So excited to assemble and decorate my cake now. Woman if I could give you a kiss I would !!!
What a gorgeous comment this is, thank you!