Citrus Pistachio Pound Cake

I am one year older. Maybe it's just because I have literally been elbow deep in frosting so many times in the past two years or maybe it's because I am feeling sturdier more stable, but I didn't want a traditional birthday cake this year. Normally I commit to some sort of two or three layer cake, but the sweetness and the fillings and all the piping just wasn't appealing to me for 26. I was considering foregoing birthday sweets altogether, but decided that was quite sacrilegious for a sugar sorceress like myself. I remembered bookmarking a pistachio citrus pound cake many seasons ago, promising myself to veganize it eventually. I decided that this was quite the proper occasion to splurge on a pound or two of pistachios and a lime since those have taken quite the price hike this spring. I zested all my fruits. Organic only, because we are getting older and wiser and we don't want to put too many things in our bodies that may contain pesticides. I baked the cake really hastily because I decided to spend some time with friends earlier in the evening and it was getting quite late and I still needed to go to work in the morning. Of course, in the haste or the adaptation of my previous pound cake recipe something didn't quite work out and the cake was very browned on the edges but still a little under baked in the center and of course fell in the middle. I was frustrated and went to sleep cursing at it.


The cake tasted good, but it wasn't something I would ever share. So I came home from work on my birthday and decided to start over. I am a perfectionist at my heart of hearts and no cake was going to defeat me. Especially not on the day when I am the queen of the world. I set away to zesting and juicing and chopping more pistachios. I folded it all together and filled my pans and scraped all the bowls. The batter tasted perfect. I put my little baby pound cakes into the oven, five minutes before my partner Greg came home from work. He walked in and mentioned how nice the kitchen smelled, then looked at the timer, saw 25 minutes ticking away, and his face dropped. I realized I had messed up some dinner plans, but he assured me it would be ok & we would only be ten minutes late. When I told him there was probably another 20 minutes of baking after that, I saw in his face that I was spoilin' some serious surprise dinner plans. After a few minutes of scrambling and panicking and not wanting to take cakes full of expensive ingredients out of the oven or waste several of my friends' time, I realized I could ask someone else I live with to take the cakes out of the oven. I asked a housemate and he so nicely agreed, so this year I got to have my cake & eat it too. Note to self for twenty six: Utilize your resources, but don't squander them. It helps if you can offer cake in return for favors. Also, buy yourself flowers more than once a year. It feels great.



Mini Citrus Pistachio Pound Cakes
altered from Mini Almond Poundcakes by Isa Chandra, queen of vegan baking

1 lemon, zested & juiced
1 lime, zested & juiced
1 orange, zested & juiced
7 oz almond paste
6 oz extra firm silken tofu
2/3 cup almond milk
1/3 cup citrus juice
1 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup Earth Balance margarine, melted
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup pistachios, finely chopped

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease & flour three 4x2" loaf pans.
Zest each of the citrus fruits and set the zest aside. Juice all the fruits and stir mixture well. You'll need a third cup of juice for the recipe; I stirred the remainder into the water I was drinking for prosperity. Combine almond paste, tofu, almond milk, citrus juice, and sugar in a blender or food processor bowl. Blend until smooth. Add the vanilla and melted margarine and blend again. In a large bowl whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, and zest until well combined. Whisk in wet until just combined. Add 1/4 cup pistachios and fold with a spatula. Portion into loaf pans until 3/4 full. Smooth tops and sprinkle with remaining pistachios. Bake for 40-50 minutes until the tops are firm & golden and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Key Lime Pie

I am a chronic list-maker, an over-calculator, a worrier. I obsess over details. I am often a perfectionist. These are some of the things that make me successful at running a bakery. These are some of the things that keep me awake at night. I push myself a little too hard and often don't know when to take a step back. Sometimes I dream just a little too big. I have been working on this for years. I am a teeny bit less high strung, but I am still overwhelmed most of the time. I will look at something I make and see all of the flaws. I will think about how jagged the crust looks or that the texture doesn't look quite right or maybe my piping is a little sloppy. I will consider starting over. I will remember I don't have enough time to start over. I will settle and give whatever I have made to whoever it was intended for. And then they will be so happy that I will realize it doesn't look quite as terrible as I thought.


Sometimes you aren't really thinking and you pour a boiling hot pan of pie filling into a graham cracker crust a little too soon. It starts to melt the crust and pieces of graham cracker float to the top. You panic. But then you realize that you can just sprinkle more graham cracker crumbs and make it look intentional. In fact, it looks great. And you'll probably do it again in the future. Not pouring the boiling filling in too soon (at least not intentionally but sometimes I am just a tiny bit impatient), rather the crumb sprinkling for decoration's sake.
This pie is made using the key lime recipe from Vegan Pie in the Sky, with some very slight modifications. I use a little more lime juice, zest, & agar and a little less coconut milk. Nothing major. I have just made it a few times now, and know what works best for me. But the recipe is terrific. If you can't find agar powder, agar flakes will work just as well. Just use one tablespoon per teaspoon of the powder. But enough of the science, back to the cookbook. Vegan Pie in the Sky is my most used cookbook to date. Jenna asked me to look through it while she was visiting and in flipping through it with her, I realized that I have made over half the recipes at least once. You should consider taking it for a spin. Fall is coming faster than I would like to admit, but it's the perfect time for pie.


I have been on sort of a pie spree lately. I don't know what's gotten into me. I don't really enjoy making pie crust, but if there is something that I can use a cookie crust for it will be on the table lightning fast. I made both key lime and coconut cream pie (recipe coming soon!for a barbecue at my house last week, because I couldn't decide which would be better (have I also mentioned that I am indecisive?). I have been thinking a lot about chocolate pudding pie again, but I want to make something new. Maybe the banoffee pie Ashlae of Oh, Ladycakes made earlier this week? Do you have pie on your mind too?