Paleo Chocolate Mini-Bundt Cakes

These moist, fruity Paleo chocolate mini-Bundt cakes are a great Paleo treat that you can make with either carob or cacao powder and honey. Ground coconut and eggs hold the cake together. Drizzled with Lekkco chocolate sauce! GF, DF

I was gifted jars of Lekkco’s Belgian chocolate spreads as a part of attending the Online Nourished Festival recently. These chocolate spreads come in flavors including Dark Chocolate, Coconut Dark Chocolate, Caramel Sea Salt (my favorite) and Caribbean Banana Dark Chocolate.

Lekkco’s chocolate spreads are perfect for a decorating a recipe like these little Bundt cakes because the spread melts very quickly to make it drizzle-able. Two tablespoonfuls melted in a glass measuring cup in the microwave in 30 seconds were plenty for one mini-bundt. 

Derived from a 50-year old Belgian recipe, Lekkco is the first nut-free, gluten-free, vegan, low-sugar, dark chocolate spread to be introduced in the United States. Lekkco's website features quite a few recipes made with their spreads in case you have any left over and don't just eat the rest out of the jar.

I don’t recommend re-microwaving the Lekkco spread, though, as when I tried that it got clumpy - so of course I had to just eat that off the spoon! 

Tips for mini-bundts at high altitude

In high-altitude Denver I bake this recipe in my little mini-Bundt pans rather than the 10-12 cup pan in the recipe I've adapted here. This allows me to bake for about half the time needed for a full-sized Bundt and I'm less likely to have unbaked tunnels I might with a full-sized cake.

The silicone pan, plus greasing with coconut oil and dusting with carob powder, ensures that the little cakes will pop right out of the pans once they have cooled enough. The cakes continue to set as they cool down. 

I strongly recommend silicone mini-bundt pans, as they made baking this recipe a piece of cake (pun intended). They are flexible, even a little floppy, but two of them fit onto the baking sheet that I had in the oven as I preheated it, so they were actually pretty easy to get in and out.

We're making more Paleo desserts

As I transition my recipes toward more Paleo options, I’d like to highlight Jane Berthelemy’s great recipes on her blog, Jane’s Healthy Kitchen. Jane points out that the sweets she has developed are not to be eaten every day, but are treats. She suggests low-glycemic sweeteners or, as I've used here, honey. 

I have adapted this recipe from hers by reducing the amounts of honey - since the fruit gives the cake its owns sweetness. I've also reduced the leavening for baking at high altitude.

We found the fruit flavors - blueberry, apple and orange peel - and the pudding-like texture to be just right.

One of the keys to this recipe is the homemade ground coconut. You need to grind it to a powder without allowing it to turn to coconut butter. The food processor works for this for the large batch.  A spice grinder can grind small amounts of coconut at a time, but you have to keep an eye on it so it doesn't over-process to butter.

Can I substitute coconut flour for the ground coconut in this recipe? 

You can’t. Coconut flour is made from coconut solids left over after the coconut meat has been used to make coconut milk. That's why coconut flour is so dehydrating in a recipe - most of the moisture and oil has been removed from it. 

Ground coconut (which is your goal here) still contains the moisture and good fats of dried, whole coconut. The trick is to grind the coconut finely enough so that you don’t get the texture of coconut, but that it doesn’t turn into coconut butter. 

When stirred into the other dry ingredients, including the carob or cacao, the ground coconut resembles coarse flour.

Can I use coconut butter in this recipe? 

I haven’t tried it myself but I suspect this would be like trying to sub nut butter for chopped nuts. The ground coconut gives the cake texture and body, which coconut butter would not. 

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Decorating your Bundt cakes

Making mini-Bundt cakes lets you decorate each one differently than if you make one large one - and of course you can skip decorating at all. The cake itself is Paleo; all of the decorating options I’ve shown are gluten-free, but not all are paleo. 

• Sprinkled with powdered sweetener: Paleo if the sweetener is monkfruit
• Drizzled with melted Lekkco spread: the chocolate spread is sweetened with glucose, so if you are limiting sugars for any reason, including if you are eating Paleo, omit, or view it as the treat it is! 
• With Lekkco and hazelnuts: This is a delicious option for anyone who can eat nuts.

Other desserts you may enjoy

Dark Chocolate-Dipped Paleo Matcha Shortbread Cookies

Easter Egg Cookies Paleo with Lemon Curd

Almond Flour-Carob Pinwheel Cookies

Plum Breakfast Cake with Plum Caramel Sauce; Paleo

German Apple Cake; Gluten-Free

If you make this or any of the recipes on A Meal In Mind, please let me know! Or if you like the recipe, leave a comment, rate it, post pictures on Facebook or Twitter. Hashtag a photo #amealinmind on Instagram.  I’d love to see what you come up with. Thank you so much!!

Beth

Sharing this recipe on The Lazy Gastronome # 315.

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5 from 8 votes

Paleo Chocolate Mini-Bundt Cakes

Here's a rich, dense cake with most of its sweetness from fruit. Its only flour is ground coconut, making it paleo and gluten-free. Delicious with Lekkco chocolate drizzle!

Course ,Cake, Baked Good, Dessert

Cuisine American, Paleo

Prep Time 25 minutes minutes

Cook Time 25 minutes minutes

Servings 8 mini-cakes

Author Beth

Equipment

• Silicone mini bundt pans
• Baking sheet
• Food Processor
• Blender

Ingredients

• 1 ¾ cups shredded unsweetened coconut flakes
• 1 cup pure carob or cacao powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda about ⅞ teaspoon at high altitude
• 1 teaspoon baking powder about ⅞ teaspoon at high altitude
• ½ teaspoon pink sea salt
• ¼ cup arrowroot powder
• 3 large eggs at room temperature
• ½ cup honey
• 1 cup blueberries fresh, at room temperature
• 1 ½ tart apples unpeeled, cored and cut into chunks (275 grams)
• 1 ½ tablespoons pure vanilla extract
• Grated zest of one orange

Optional Toppings

• 1 -2 tablespoons per mini-cake of Lekkco dark chocolate caramel syrup
• Powdered sugar or non-caloric sweetener
• Chopped hazelnuts or other nuts of choice

Instructions

• Preheat the oven to 350°F (375 for high altitude). Grease 8 mini Bundt pans (capacity 1 ¼ cup each) with coconut oil, and flour liberally with carob powder.
• Grind the shredded coconut to the food processor. Whiz it for 2-3 minutes until a very fine powder, stirring each minute or so to keep what is collecting on the bottom from turning into butter.
• To the ground coconut, add the carob powder, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and arrowroot. Process briefly to mix, and pour into a large mixing bowl.
• Place in a blender the eggs, blueberries, apples, vanilla, orange peel, and honey. Blend well until liquefied.
• Pour the wet ingredients into the dry mixture. Mix briefly to remove any lumps. Pour the batter evenly into the prepared Bundt pans. Used mini-bundt; bake 25-30 minutes.
• Bake the mini-Bundts for 25-30 minutes (40 to 50 minutes for a 10-cup Bundt cake), or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Let cool for 10 minutes in the pan. The silicone pans cool to the touch very quickly, so that you can cover the pan with a serving platter, carefully flip it over so that the cakes fall onto the platter, and let cool 30 minutes more.
• Chocolate Sauce: While the cake is toward the end of the cooling time, or just before serving, warm up the Lekkco chocolate spread until it is pourable, about 30 seconds in the microwave or 1 minute or so in a small saucepan.
• Drizzle Chocolate Sauce generously on top of the cooled cake until it pools on the cake stand or plate. Or sprinkle with powdered sweetener of your choice for a simple option.

Notes

The carob or cacao flour dusted into the baking pans will help prevent sticking, though it's not really needed with silicone bundt pans.

By Jane of Jane's Healthy Kitchen

 

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