For many years, my favorite chocolate cake recipe was Ina Garten’s Beatty Chocolate Cake. It is rich, moist, and completely delicious. The only problem is that it is not vegan. It has buttermilk, eggs, and butter. I tried and failed miserably at making a vegan version. It was so bad we had to throw out the fallen cupcakes after spitting out the bites we had taken. It was so bad, it was funny.

One of my favorite people has a birthday on April 1st. No fooling. I wanted to bake her something special and decided to try to make chocolate cake or cupcakes again. This time, I decided to forego the experimentation and try Isa Chandra Moskowitz’s recipe for chocolate raspberry cake. This time, it was a complete success. The cake is just as good as the former dairy rich cake, maybe even a little better. “You can’t even tell it’s vegan!” was the exclamation from my friend. I think that was a compliment.

The recipe is in “Vegan with a Vengeance“, Isa’s amazing cookbook from 2005. I highly recommend it. If you don’t have the book, I did find the recipe posted on Food.com. However, I think we should support our tireless cookbook authors. If you like this recipe, consider buying the book so she’ll continue gracing us with her excellent recipes. You can also check out her website and blog, Post Punk Kitchen.

A note on the recipe: I didn’t have soy milk, so I used unsweetened almond milk instead for both the cake and the ganache. It worked just fine. I baked the cupcakes for 22-24 minutes. Check them after this time. They are done when a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean or with just a few crumbs.