For all you coffee lovers, I have the perfect recipe for you! This eggless coffee-walnut cake is super soft and fluffy. Oh and that kick of coffee and bite from the walnuts- SO good!
I’m notorious and guilty for dunking my cake in coffee. The mouthfeel of a freshly baked cake mixed with the strong spell casting taste of coffee is impeccable. To combine both of these is such a brilliant idea. This coffee walnut cake is what a coffee lover’s dreams are made of. Perfectly sweetened, strongly flavoured with coffee and the nuttiness from the walnuts make it the combination we have all been waiting for. This bakery style cake is eggless and has the creamiest cream cheese icing.
I’m more excited than ever to frost my coffee walnut cake with cream cheese since this time the cream cheese is also made at home. YES, you can find the recipe right here. This is perfect as I do understand that not all grocery stores offer creamcheese. Now you can continue with your baking adventures without worrying about where to procure that cream cheese from! If you make this, please also tag me on Instagram!
THE EGG REPLACER
Over years and years of recreating recipes, I have come to determine that yoghurt works as the best replacer for my cakes. This coffee walnut does not need eggs, so people who do not consume eggs can enjoy this too. YAY! As a replacement I have used yoghurt. Your basic homemade ‘dahi’ will also work well here. To activate the yoghurt I have used a chemical leavening agent- bicarbonate soda, commonly known as baking soda. Baking soda is alkaline in nature and reacts when comes in contact with acidic ingredients. The yoghurt here acts as an acidic ingredient and reacts with the baking soda. This creates a reaction and bubbles of carbon dioxide are produced. These bubbles will now get trapped in the batter and help our cake rise and be absolutely amazing. Enough science back to baking now. Haha!
COFFEE GOODNESS
The coffee walnut cake should remind you of a cup of coffee as soon as you bite into it. To recreate this experience I have made sure to use the perfect amount of coffee. To prepare the concoction I have taken equal parts of coffee and hot water. Hot water will activate the coffee better and bring out the flavour by awakening the coffee powder. My go-to coffee brand for instant coffee is nescafe. However you can take this one step further and elevate the taste even more by adding a single shot of espresso.
THE FROSTING
Now that we have obtained our freshly made cream cheese at home. It’s time to whip it up and make the smoothest cream cheese frosting for our coffee walnut cake. All you need to make the frosting is softened butter, icing sugar, vanilla and cream cheese. Make sure that the butter is soft and not melted. This will not do justice to the texture of the frosting. Also, use a good vanilla extract or vanilla bean. This may seem small, but makes such a major difference. Lastly icing sugar will give structure to the frosting, this can be replaced by powdered sugar just make sure you add a little cornflour to the mix for stability.
BAKING THE CAKE IN A MICROWAVE
Just like most of my recipes, this cake is versatile enough to bake in an oven and a microwave. For the oven, I would recommend baking it at 180 C for 30-35 minutes.
But, for a microwave, bake it at 180C in the convection mode for about 25 minutes.
And if you want to understand the basics of baking a cake in a microwave, I have a blog post about How to bake a microwave (link the blog). For the video, check out my youtube channel here.
- 1 + 1⁄2 cups (180g) all purpose flour (maida)
- 1 teaspoon (4g) baking powder
- 1 cup (285g) yogurt
- 1⁄2 teaspoon (3g) baking soda
- 3⁄4 cup (150g) castor sugar
- 1⁄2 cup (120mL) vegetable oil
- 1 teaspoon (5mL) Vanilla Extract
- 2 tbsp coffee powder + 2 tbsp hot water ¼ cup
- (63g) crushed walnuts
- 1 cup (225gm) cream cheese, softened
- 1⁄2 cup (100gm) butter, softened
- seeds from half vanilla pod
- 1 + 1⁄2 cup icing sugar, sifted
- Preheat the oven @ 180C.
- In a clean bowl, add the yogurt and baking soda. Give it a good mix using a spoon and let it sit for 5-10 minutes until it becomes foamy.
- In a separate bowl add the sugar and vegetable oil. Using a whisk mix this really well for about 3-4 minutes. Add the vanilla extract and mix it.
- Add the yogurt and baking soda mix and combine well.
- In a separate bowl add coffee powder and water, mix it and add it to the cake batter.
- Now to the batter through a sift add the flour and baking powder. Using a spatula gently fold the dry mix in. Mix until you don't see any large flour pockets.
- Add the walnuts and give it a final mix. Transfer to an 8’ baking pan lined with parchment paper.
- Bake @ 180C for 30-35 minutes until a skewer inserted comes out clean.
- To make the frosting, whisk the butter, cream cheese and vanilla together until the mixture is light and fluffy. Add the sugar and use a spatula to mix until the frosting is smooth and fluffy.
- Generously top the cake with frosting once the cake has cooled completely.
Hi, thanks for the recipe. I did as instructed, following your steps to the point.
Still my cake didn’t bake as expected. Outer was well done but on the inside, everything was gooey and did not rise as it always suppose to. Please help and tell me where was i wrong. Attaching images in the link
https://imgur.com/5Ae4r4D
https://imgur.com/oAs0ZrB
Thanks Shivesh, for this awesome recipe! I never thought coffee flavoured cake would turn out sooo good. And it was so soft as well. We made 2 layered cake, combined this with a chocolate cake and it was just heavenly! We added 1 tbsp coffee instead of 2, will try more next time… thanks again, dad’s bday became memorable:)
Tried this out just now. It turned out TOO bitter. Too too bitter. I have used the Bru gold coffee powder. Is that the reason it turned out this strong ??
Hi, should the curd we use in this be sour or fresh curd?
Hi Shivesh,
Can we make this cake with whole wheat (atta) ? Can you please share the proportions.
Thanks,
Pallavi
I made this cake and felt that since there was no butter it could have done with some salt in it.
Some queries ;
1. The measurements of 1 cup =240gms
then is maida 1-1/2 cup =360gms?
2. How Yogurt 1cup =285gms?
3. Please suggest can we use honey/jaggery powder/brown sugar in place of white sugar n if yes then refer the quantity .
My husband, daughter and I are coffee lovers and this cake is amazingly flavourful… Just perfect crumb and super moist… Addition to my baking list now on!
I tried this recepie. I could not believe my taste buds. I did not expect this to be such a big hit. It was way too good.. I loved it
Amazing recipe Shivesh! Keep making more of such eggless recipes. Will be looking forward to it 🙂
Love the coffee cake .. thank you
Tried this recipe yesterday. Turned out really well. My mother, who generally is not fond of anything coffee, ended up eating a big chunk and I was super happy. Thanks for sharing.
Hi Shivesh,
Is it 2 tablespoon plus 1/4 cup of water mixed with coffee powder
I made this cake for my pastry chef brother-in-law’s birthday and hid reaction was, “Are you in the market for a job?” This recipe is so so good, thank you!
Hi Shivesh, when using home-made curd or even the store bought curd (not yoghurt), do you recommend hanging it to remove all the liquid from it and get that thick yoghurt consistency or can I use the curd as is? Please let me know.
Thanks!!!
Great recipe shivesh!! The cake was amazing 🙂
Thank you. Tried and it was good.
Thank you for this recipe. I can’t wait to try it. Are there any adjustments required if I replace all purpose flour with wholemeal wheat flour?
Hi Shivesh,
I tried the eggless coffee walnut cake, though the batter was yum but the cake became too hard as had to bake it for long because it was soft from the center.
Hi you have mentioned 2 tbsp coffee powder and 2 tbsp hot water. and again 1/4 cup. that’s confusing. can you please confirm how much water to use with 2 tbsp coffee powder ?
Hi Shivesh, I started baking cakes after visiting your blog and videos on YouTube. Started with vanilla cake and chocolate cake. Today I followed this recipe and made the cake for father’s day. It came out absolutely smashing. It was finished in one sitting, everyone loved it. Thanks so much for making our Father’s day special.
Thanks for sharing this post. After a long time, such a post has been seen, it is a very interesting subject, people like it. When someone shares this kind of article, the mind is happy The
Really lovely moist cake. Delicious & easy to make- thank you.
This is an amazing article. I visit here for the first time and read each and every point of your article. Thank you for your awesome work.
Made this cake today. I’m Pakistani born and this was reminiscent of a coffee cake i ate from a bakery in a neighboring city i grew up in as a girl. I used two 6 inch round baking pans and baked the cakes for about 25 minutes. then I filled and frosted the cooled cakes with my own Ermine buttercream flavored with instant coffee. It was great! Nice and moist, tender but doesn’t fall apart. Best part is, I wont have to share it with my kids…since they don’t like walnuts! Thank you so much!