Vegan Speculoos Tangerine Cake

When I think of Christmas cakes, not so many come to mind. Is Christstollen even a cake? And isn't gingerbread more of a cookie? Even in our own Christmas recipe section, there are only two recipes: Spice Cake and Speculoos Cake, a rather sad collection. But that’s history! Our latest addition is wonderfully fruity, light and fluffy.

Tangerine speculoos cake is a cake I did not know existed. But when I saw pictures on the Internet, I knew I had to make a vegan version. There were so many versions that I was nothing but astonished as I had never seen it before. But now, after making it several times, I'm equipped to say it is a delicious and simple cake for the Christmas season. But let's take it step by step:

The sponge cake batter: a soft bed for our layers. I prepared a basic sponge cake batter. It's supposed to give the cake stability, so it's easier to cut into slices later. Of course, you could also make yeast dough instead. For baking, I used a square pan (22 x 28 cm/8,5 inch x 11 inches). You can also use a small springform pan instead.

The tangerine layer: I used canned tangerines for this recipe, but you can also use fresh ones. To turn the tangerines into a creamy and gooey fruit layer, we boiled them down with the brand new Hygge Punsch Apple Tangerine from Voelkel. By using this flavorful punch, we didn’t need to buy extra spices. The punch contains cinnamon, coriander, anise, cloves, cardamom, ginger, and the like. So instead of buying a lot of spices and taking a long time seasoning, we boil the tangerines and the punch briefly and end up with a Christmassy fruit layer, free of artificial flavors or dyes. Incidentally, the tangerines for the punch come from a project that buys explicitly from small family farms and harvests the fruit at the peak of its flavor expression. They are pressed on-site and transported to Germany by ship in an environmentally friendly manner.

The cinnamon cream: When developing the recipe, I tried two different kinds of cream topping – one with cinnamon and the other one without it. As a result, the office split into two opposing groups: Those who loved the cinnamon and those who thought it was "too Christmassy". So feel free to decide whether to add cinnamon to the whipped cream or not. I was also a big fan of the cinnamon whipped cream.

The speculoos layer: The most simple layer, because at the end all you have to do is to putspeculoos cookies on your vegan cream layer, that’s it! When shopping, make sure to buy vegan speculoos because they often contain butter or milk. With spiced speculoos, it's often easier, but better recheck the ingredient list to be on the safe side.

After you have prepared all the layers, you can quickly assemble them. We used a square baking frame and let the cake sit in the fridge overnight. It helps soften the speculoos cookies, so you can quickly go through them with your cake fork. If you don't have a square baking frame at home, you can layer your cake in a baking dish.