Finding the Perfect Vegan Wedding Cake

Photo Credit: Anna Delores Photography

As a self-pronounced sweets addict, I knew I had to make sure my wedding cake was amazing. Not just good for vegan standards, but objectively delicious. Some people may not realize that vegan cake can taste just as good (or better) than the traditional dairy and egg-laden cake, so it was my mission to prove just that.

This type of attitude definitely comes from my mom. Lucky for me, my mom is very supportive of my vegan lifestyle and she also happens to be the best cook I know. She loves veganizing recipes, resulting in homemade nut cheese ricotta, seitan sausage puffs, crispy peanut tofu…the list goes on and on. I’m pretty sure she’s the reason why I gained weight after going vegan 😛 But she also made me realize that vegan cake can be really, REALLY good. One of my all-time favorite desserts is her vegan bundt cake with caramel drizzle. Mmm.

So, on to the vegan wedding cake search and my ridiculously high standards (thanks, mom!). SoCal has lots of vegetarian, vegan, and vegan-friendly restaurants all over the place, but surprisingly, it was pretty difficult finding a bakery that would make a completely dairy and egg free cake for our wedding. The places I did find were a bit lackluster with a limited selection of vegan options – typically chocolate and red velvet flavors only – and the texture and/or taste was off. I was also surprised to find that the bakeries that offered vegan cake often times did not offer a plain vanilla cake. I asked one bakery why that is and they said that it’s one of the hardest flavors to get right without dairy in it. This sounded like a challenge to me.

Thankfully, we ended up finding Two Birds Bakery – a fully vegan bakery located in Orange County. Two Birds Bakery offers a wide selection of fun cupcake and cake flavors that exceeded not only my expectations but my mom’s as well! They totally would have made us vegan vanilla cake if we wanted it, but we ended up opting for their more interesting flavors. Our three-tier cake consisted of two separate flavors – Churro Donut and Cookies & Cream. The design was on the simpler side with a white horizontal frosting that gave the cake a more rustic feel, and our florist decorated it with beautiful peonies and roses. The cake ended up being delicious. A lot of our guests thought the Churro Donut flavor was carrot cake but it tasted and looked good so I didn’t care. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

We also had a selection of mini cupcakes, including Funfetti Oreo, Strawberry Birthday Cake, Boozy Apple Pie, and Ding Dongs (!!). David and I didn’t get a chance to try any of them the night of the wedding, but we heard rave reviews about them. It’s on my list to pick up some of these flavors the next time we’re close by to Two Birds’ shop.

Overall, I’m really happy with how our cake turned out and I owe that all to the research we did & the fact that we didn’t settle for less, despite having seemingly limited options.

Tips for finding the perfect vegan wedding cake:

1. Do your homework. Yelp and Google are great for starters, but also look at previous VegNews Magazine wedding issues for leads as well as online vegan publications.
2. Ask your caterer. If they don’t do wedding cakes, they might have a recommendation.
3. Try Whole Foods. They have surprisingly good vegan cake. I’m not sure if it’s only available in certain regions, but every Whole Foods I’ve been to in Southern California has had vegan cake options. Their cookies & cream cake is bomb.
4. See if a local vegan restaurant can make the cake. Even if it isn’t on the menu, they may take special orders.
5. Search for vegan personal chefs in your area. Again, this might not be their area of expertise but they might know how to make a great wedding cake.
6. If you’re on the fence about a bakery, it’s okay to say no and keep searching. You CAN find the vegan wedding cake of your dreams!

Do you have any suggestions or tips for finding a vegan wedding cake? Feel free to comment below!