This avocado toast cake is inspired by…avocado toast! With a simple foil design, you can make the cutest cake design!

Avocado Toast Cake // The Pancake Princess

Originally, this was meant to be a play on that popular mermaid toast taking over instagram, but in cake form (with heavy inspiration from Steph’s unicorn cake). Someone helpfully pointed out that without any blues or purples in the frosting, this cake really just looks like avocado toast cake.

I might try mashing in some blueberries in the future for a more mermaid-esque cake, but I am actually pretty pleased with how this turned out as an avocado toast cake. All you have to do is add matcha to the frosting and then swirl it around until it looks amazing.

You can use whatever cake you like for this; I chose a scaled down version of this buttermilk cake from Sweetapolita–it’s dense and tightly-crumbed which makes it very easy to cut and shape. I tried it both with a plain vanilla cake base and then with a marbled base, swirling matcha into half of the silky batter. Both yielded a slightly drier cake, which I thought was perfect for big swoops of frosting–and the slightly bitter notes of matcha are an excellent complement to the typically uber-sweet buttercream.

I actually tried this cake with two different types of matcha by accident, and I was shocked at how much more vibrant my Aiya matcha was compared to my shall-not-be-named other matcha. You already know I love matcha from these s’mores, but using it in this cake and frosting made me even more excited about the beautiful, high-quality matcha from the Aiya team.

PS. I am v curious to try this avocado frosting (with matcha, of course) instead of the buttercream–let me know if you try it out!

Thanks Aiya Matcha for sponsoring this post, and thank you for reading, as always! All opinions are my own, and I think this socially-conscious, family-owned matcha company is very cool and worth checking out.

Notes:

Since you’ll be spreading the frosting to the edges of the cake, you really don’t need a toast-shaped pan to get the crust look the way I had originally envisioned. A square cake works fine; you can just cut your desired toast shape out of it. However, if you ever need to make a specialty pan, I’ve discovered that foil will work! (See picture above.)
You can use your favorite vanilla cake (or chocolate or any flavor for that matter, since you can’t really see it under the frosting) for this. To marble the cake, simply divide the batter in half and add anywhere from 1-2 teaspoons of matcha powder, then swirl the batters together in the cake pan (this will follow the recipe as written).
The frosting amount is scaled for a cake cut out of an 8×8 pan, but you can really use any size cake and increase the frosting as needed.
Although it is annoying to use 7 tablespoons of butter and 1 tablespoon of oil in this recipe, this is a scaled down version of Rosie’s buttermilk cake. She is convinced it imparts an extra touch of moisture to the cake and I don’t argue with cake geniuses.
I added gold flakes because of the original mermaid cake intention. I think flavor-wise, this cake could totally benefit from some milk crumbs sprinkled on top, or maybe sprinkles. You decorate your avocado toast however you feel.

PRINT PIN

No ratings yet

Avocado Toast Cake

Author Erika Kwee

Ingredients

For the cake:

1.5 cups cake flour
1 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
heaping 1/4 teaspoon flaky sea salt
7 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon oil coconut, olive or canola all work
1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons buttermilk divided (I use almond milk with a splash of apple cider vinegar)
3 eggs room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla
1.5 teaspoons Aiya matcha powder

For the frosting:

3 tablespoons butter room temperature
3/4 cup powdered sugar
pinch of salt
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon milk
Aiya matcha powder as needed

Instructions

To make the cake:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and grease an 8×8 baking pan.
Sift together the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Using an electric beater, add in the butter in small pieces, about 10 seconds apart. Beat until the butter is incorporated in small crumbs, then add the oil and continue to beat until there are no clumps and you have a fine, crumbly, cornmeal-like texture (this will take a few minutes).
Add ½ cup of the milk to the mixture and beat for 4 minutes until pale, thick and smooth (beating for this long will help create a more even consistency that will bake into a more even cake). Beat the eggs and vanilla into the remaining milk mixture and gradually add the egg mixture to the rest of the ingredients. Increase speed to medium and beat for one minute, then scrape down the sides and fold batter a few times to make sure everything is incorporated.
Divide the batter in half. Beat the matcha into half the batter until evenly incorporated.
Pour batter into prepared pan, marbling as desired, and bake for 35-40 minutes, or until edges are golden and an inserted toothpick comes out clean. Let cool before cutting into a toast shape.

To make the frosting:

Beat the butter and sugar together. Beat in the salt, vanilla, and milk until smooth.
If going for an ombre look, divide the frosting into 2-3 bowls. Keep one bowl of frosting plain. Add matcha 1/4 teaspoon at a time to the other bowl(s) of frosting until you achieve your desired color and flavor (taste as needed). Use a large offset spatula to frost the cake in sweeping waves of frosting! Add gold flakes/milk crumbs/other cake bling as desired.