This vegan lemon cake is pure lemony perfection!
Jaye was saying it’s exactly like the lemon cake his grandmother used to make! Which is high praise considering his grandmother was quite the chef.
The recipe is based on our vegan vanilla cake, with lots of lemon flavor added in via lemon zest and lemon extract and of course, a delicious lemon buttercream frosting and lots of lemon zest as decoration.
MY LATEST VIDEOSIt’s super easy, and will happily fulfil all your lemon cake dreams!
When looking around the web at lemon cakes though, I saw a lot of lemon loaf cakes. And I definitely want to make one of those too! But that isn’t what comes to my mind when I think of a lemon cake, to me a lemon cake is a lemon layer cake, and a lemon loaf cake or a lemon pound cake is the loaf cake. Anyway, just saying because I hope you didn’t come to this page hoping for a loaf cake! If you did, well, I’ll do one of those soon too don’t worry, I want to do ALL the cakes! (Update: Vegan lemon pound cake is here!)
I went with two 8 inch cake pans for this cake. Usually my preference has been for 7 inch cake pans, but I have broken out! I got some 8 inch cake pans and I am going to be making a bunch of cakes for 8 inch cake pans now!
And to spread the love, I plan on getting some 9 inch pans too and making some cakes for those too! But that’s still coming, let’s not get ahead of ourselves, let’s focus on these gorgeous 8 inch cake pans right here.
And don’t these layers look fat and gorgeous? They rise just beautifully!
I didn’t use a flax egg in this cake, which I also don’t use in my vanilla cake recipe that I based this recipe on. I don’t find I need it in this recipe and I don’t want it to affect the color. In light colored cakes, a flax egg can affect the color leading it to look a bit spotty, so in this case it’s best to leave it out.
So there isn’t any specific egg replacer in this recipe, unless you count the baking soda/vinegar combination, which definitely acts together to create some crucial baking science that I won’t claim to understand but as you can see, it all just works!
That’s all I’ve ever done with my cakes, try things and see if they work, and they definitely do! At least the ones published here do, the failures don’t make it to the blog (of course).
So I really think you are going to love this vegan lemon cake! It is:
- 2-Layers
- So Lemony!
- Moist
- Spongey
- Topped with velvety lemon buttercream!
Keep it covered at room temperature where it will stay gorgeous for a few days or keep it covered in the fridge where it will last for up to a week.
So what do you think of this gorgeous vegan lemon cake? Let us know in the comments and please be so kind as to rate the recipe too! Thank you!
For more gorgeous vegan cakes, check out these great recipes:
And heaps more!
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Vegan Lemon Cake
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Prep Time: 20 mins - Cook Time: 30 mins
- Total Time: 50 minutes
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Yield: 10-12 -
Category: Dessert, Cakes, Baking -
Cuisine: Vegan
Print Recipe
Pin RecipeDescription
Ultra-lemony 2-layer vegan lemon cake with a velvety lemon buttercream frosting! This delicious vegan cake is perfectly moist and spongey and will make all your lemon cake dreams come true!
Ingredients
For the Vegan Lemon Cake:
- 2 and 1/2 cups (312g) + 2 Tbsp All Purpose Flour
- 1 and 1/2 cups (300g) White Sugar
- 1 and 1/2 tsp Baking Soda
- 3/4 tsp Salt
- 1 and 1/2 cups (360ml) Soy Milk (or other non-dairy milk)
- 1/2 cup (120ml) Olive Oil*
- 1 Tbsp White Vinegar (or Apple Cider Vinegar)
- 1 tsp Vanilla Extract
- 3 tsp Lemon Extract
- 2 Tbsp Lemon Zest*
For the Lemon Buttercream Frosting:
- 4 and 1/2 cups (540g) Powdered Sugar
- 1/2 cup (112g) Vegan Butter
- 3 and 1/2 Tbsp Lemon Juice
- 2 tsp Lemon Extract
For Decoration:
- Lemon Zest
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350Β°F (180Β°C).
- Spray two 8 inch cake pans with non-stick spray and line the bottoms with parchment paper. Set aside.
- Sift the flour into a mixing bowl and add the sugar, baking soda and salt. Then add the soy milk, olive oil, vinegar, vanilla, lemon extract and lemon zest. Whisk with a hand whisk briefly until nicely combined and no big lumps remain. Don’t overmix, tiny lumps are okay.
- Divide the batter between the two cake pans and place into the oven to bake for 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of one of the cakes comes out clean.
- Remove the cakes from the pans and place onto a wire cooling rack to cool completely before frosting.
- Prepare your frosting by placing the powdered sugar, vegan butter, lemon juice and lemon extract into the bowl of an electric mixer. Start off at slow speed, gradually increasing speed until thick and smooth. If your frosting is too thin, add more powdered sugar, if it’s too thick, add a drop more lemon juice until you get the right consistency.
- Frost the cooled cakes and decorate with lemon zest.
Notes
*You can switch the olive oil for canola oil or other vegetable oil if you prefer, but I used extra virgin olive oil.
*2 Tbsp of lemon zest is from about 2 lemons, but it does depend on the size of the lemons, if it’s a large lemon you might get 2 Tbsp worth of zest from 1 lemon.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 Slice (of 12)
- Calories: 512
- Sugar: 69.5g
- Sodium: 400mg
- Fat: 14.2g
- Saturated Fat: 2.2g
- Carbohydrates: 92.8g
- Fiber: 0.8g
- Protein: 3.8g
Absolutely perfect!
★★★★★
Hi there! Your timing is perfect. My partner’s birthday comes up in a couple weeks and she adores lemon cake. One thing, when we’ve eaten vegan baked goods from restaurants the buttercream tends to be way too sweet, is this buttercream very sweet? Do you think it would work to cut out a good bit of the powdered sugar? Thank you for your lovely recipes. I just found your blog today whilst looking for shortbread cookies. I’m excited to make your lovely recipes and will report back when I have. Cheers!
Hi Jules, the frosting is definitely sweet! The lemon juice does cut the sweetness a bit but it definitely is sweet. If you are looking for a less sweet version it might be an idea to use this cake recipe with a different frosting, maybe a vegan cream cheese frosting. All the best! π
Thank you, Alison!
Hi,
Do you think i can use gluten free flour instead? Thanks
Hi Rima, I have not tested this cake as gluten-free so can’t advise.
Hi Rima,
My friend made this recipe with 1:1 gluten-free flour and it came out delicious!
Lemony yet sweet and delicious
★★★★★
YUM! Awesome cake! fresh, lemony and perfectly sweet! Great crumb and flavor! I’ve made this twice now. Once without changing anything, and another with added poppyseeds and a lemon glaze instead of frosting! Thanks for sharing!!
★★★★★
Fantastic Rosie! Thanks for posting and your review! π
Brilliant!! I turned them into cupcakes and they were moist, spongy. And delicious. I even used the base and added strawberries instead of lemon and they were amazing. Thanks for this recipe!
★★★★★
That sounds fab! Thanks for posting! π
Hiya! This recipe looks delicious! My friend is vegan and I’m making his 18th B-day cake. He wants lemon and poppyseed… what measurements for the poppyseeds might you be able to recommend?
Also the 2nd tier will be 15cm, but I’m not sure what the ideal baking time would be for this size…
I’ll get back to you on how it turns out! π
Hi Daisy, sorry I have no experience with poppyseeds, I haven’t used them so far in any of my baking (I’m sure I will sometime but haven’t yet!). Regarding the second tier, it might bake for the same amount of time, or it might take a little longer, I would bake both layers as usual for 30 minutes but then be prepared to put one back for a few minutes longer if needed.
Amazing. This turned out so good. I subbed real lemon juice instead of extract. The texture, flavour, everything was on point. Great job!
★★★★★
Woot! So glad to hear that Maria! Thanks so much! π
Amazing!
For the icing, instead of just doing a lemon icing, I did the same recipe and added in a few spoonfuls of my favorite wildberry jam plus a little almond milk so the icing wasn’t so thick with the jam added. It was absolutely delicious!
I will be making this cake for my wedding next June! π
Thank you so much for posting this recipe! π
★★★★★
Hi Emily! That frosting idea sounds awesome! So glad you love the cake and I’m thrilled it will be your wedding cake too, and congratulations! Thanks so much for your lovely comment and review. π
Hi, the flavour was lovely but mine rose about half as much so ended up quite dense, any ideas would be most welcome. Perhaps I overmixed!? I’ll try again .
★★★★
Hi Catherine, there can be a few reasons cakes don’t rise, over-mixing is one of them, baking soda that’s not fresh can be another one, it can be that your oven wasn’t hot enough when the cakes went in, or if the batter sat too long before baking. Did you use an electric mixer? If you mixed by hand and didn’t go totally wild then it’s less likely to be over-mixing. Glad the flavor was good though and hope it rises more the next time you try it! π
Do you think leaving out the zest would change the flair too much?
You would lose a bit of the lemon flavor that’s all. So you can leave it out if you like. π
So amazing. Super moist and lemony. Everything I was looking for.
Didnβt change the cake recipe but I used a strawberry frosting instead.
★★★★★
My granddaughter and I made this cake today. It was our first attempt at a vegan cake. Needless to say we are very happy with the results from your recipe. We used the buttercream icing as filling as Charlotte wanted to experience the use of fondant. I have never used this before. Charlotte is 11 years old and has ADHD.
We had such a lovely expr with your recipe and a wonderful afternoon together. We will be baking your cake again soon as my birthday is next month and I have asked her to make this cake for me.
Thank you
That is so amazing to hear! So glad it was a fun experience, thanks so much for sharing! π
Hi Alison
I made your vegan lemon cake late last night, for my daughter’s 12th birthday today. It’s the most successful cake I’ve baked so far and I prepare alot of food and desserts as preparing healthy meals is one of my passions. I reduced the amount of sugar in the cake and used a reduced amount of a good quality icing sugar to make a thinner frosting. The sugar I used is called rapadura sugar which has a caramel like flavour. My husband commented on how moist the cake was and everyone enjoyed eating it so it was gone in literally an hour! I’m now trying your vegan chocolate cake recipe as it’s my son’s birthday tomorrow and he wants a chocolate cake. Do you have a chocolate vegan cake recipe using 8″ pans. That;s the only size I have at the moment.
Thank you for your wonderful recipe.
★★★★★
So glad to hear the cake was a success! Thanks for sharing your adjustments too! I have an 8 inch chocolate cake recipe on the way, but it has not posted yet so won’t be in time for when you need it, you can increase our 7 inch chocolate cake recipe by half to make an 8 inch cake, but just be super careful with the calculations, as it can be tricky! Oh actually now that I think about it, our chocolate sheet cake recipe would probably adapt pretty well to two 8 inch cake pans if you want to give that one a try. All the best! π
Hi! I made this cake for my friend’s 18th birthday and it came out SO GOOD! This is such a fab recipe… It stood for hours and everyone loved the taste! Thank you for a great vegan alternative π
He wanted a lemon and poppyseed layer cake, so I added 2 Tablespoons to each batch.
Thanks!
★★★★★
Hi Daisy! That’s so awesome! Thanks so much for posting! π
I donβt have round cake pans. Could I just use a 9 x 13 cake pan?
It might be okay in a 9×13, but I haven’t tested it that way, so not sure.
I made two gluten-free vegan variations for work – one as a lemon drizzle bundt cake and one as a simple loaf cake with buttercream icing – both went down a treat and were gone within ten minutes! I received lots of compliments from colleagues with and without dietary requirements, so it’s not just great for vegans.
That sounds fabulous Jennifer, thanks so much for sharing! π
my cake fell apart π what do you think went wrong? It smells and tastes wonderful….
Hi Rhonda, sorry to hear that! If you take a cake out of the pan too quickly, when it’s still very hot, that can be a reason, but even then it usually doesn’t happen. It can also happen if you put the cake down onto the cooling rack on its domed side instead of the right way up. Did you use all purpose flour or did you switch for a different flour? This has happened to me when experimenting with different flours.
I think maybe I took it of the pan too soon…I’m about to try again. I used all purpose. Thank you for your response
Turned out great the second time!
Superb. Absolutely superb. Sweet and so so lemony. It’s easy to make, rises beautifully, and look stunning. This is a winner, and one I’ll be making again and again! Thanks for a great recipe.
★★★★★
Awesome Morgan! Excellent news! Thanks for sharing and the great review! π
I made this at the weekend for my sisters wedding and everyone went crazy for it. One guest said it was the best cake she had ever eaten! The only thing I did differently was I used self raising flour(UK) instead of All purpose/ Plain flour. The frosting is the best vegan frosting Iβve found. Thank you!!
★★★★★
Love it! Thanks so much for sharing that! Awesome to hear. And really glad it worked perfectly with self raising flour too! π
Will this cake last till next Wednesday? We’re going camping so we’ll have to make it today!
Hi Eva, it can last up to a week in the fridge but it’s going to be declining in taste and texture towards the end there! And it would have to be in the fridge. At room temperature it’s only a few days. π
Can I sub white sugar with brown sugar?
Should be fine, but will affect the color of the cake.
I made this for my Vegan sister – it was the best Cake she had ever had – looked exactly like the photos and tasted fantastic. Thank you!
★★★★★
That is amazing! Yay! Thanks for sharing! π