Vegan Mexican Chocolate Cake, Times Two

Recently baked this cake for a Cinco de Mayo party.

Here's the recipe (courtesy of Recipezaar!)

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups unbleached all purpose white flour

1 cup sugar

1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa

2 teaspoons cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper (or ground mexican chili powder)

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup cold water

1/4 cup canola oil

1 tablespoon basalmic vinegar

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

Chocolate Glaze:

1 cup confectioners' sugar

1/2 cup cocoa

Up to 6 tablespoons water

About 10 or so fresh strawberries

Baking Instructions:

1. Heat oven to 350*F.

2. Lightly coat an 8" round cake pan with vegetable cooking spray.

3. Combine all cake ingredients in a mixing bowl and stir until smooth.

4. Pour into a pan and bake 25 to 30 minutes (until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean).

5. Cool in the pan on a wire rack for 10 minutes.

6. Remove from pan and cool completely.

7. When the cake has cooled mix together the confectioner's sugar and cocoa, adding water 1 tablespoon at a time until glaze-like

8. Dip each strawberry into the glaze and set aside.

9. Pour the remaining glaze over the cake and arrange the strawberries on top.

10. Set aside to dry- about 30 minutes.

My guests requested a bottle of hot pepper sauce as a condiment, for those who like a little extra spicy kick! ENJOY!

Update: We made this cake again for another party that needed more vegetarian/vegan options. Since it was kind of a soupy mess last time (a DELICIOUS soupy mess), we made some adjustments and created this:

We used less water for the ganache (more like 4 tbsp) and waited to add the strawberries until almost immediately before serving. The strawberry juices ran down the side of the cake and made the ganache watery!!! Still 5 NOMS!