I have made many attempts for birthday cakes at our house. Some made us sick (I knew they would, but you have to have cake, right?) and others simply did not taste very good. I recently came across this recipe at Karina’s Kitchen that gave me new hope for birthday cake. Because she is also egg free, she’s done the experimenting with egg free baking that is missing in so many gluten free recipes. Many gluten free bakers don’t want to attempt egg free as well, or they tell you right out that egg replacer will not work in their recipes. Discouraging, seeing as how eggs just seem to make my kids sick right now, no matter how much time I put between exposures to them.
Anyway, my first attempt with this recipe was a couple of weeks ago. I threw the ingredients in my kitchen aid while on the phone with a friend, and I was talking and pouring the batter into the cupcake pan when I realized that because I had decided to use agave nectar rather than sugar, I forgot to add it to the batter! Rather than spoon all the batter back out of the pan, I drizzled agave on top of each cupcake, put it in the oven and hoped for the best. It actually worked fairly well, though they were more the sweetness of muffins – not birthday cake worthy.
I tried them again last night, substituting a little less than 1 cup of agave for the sugar (agave is sweeter than sugar, cup for cup), and brown rice flour for the sorghum since sorghum seems to hurt tummies around here.
Results: They rose nicely, always amazing to me without eggs. They had a nice golden-brown color. A little crumbly but still edible, a little grainy in texture because of the rice flour, and a tad too sweet for my taste – probably would decrease the agave just a bit more. But overall? Definitely birthday worthy! I will probably frost them with this or this.
Stories and Food 
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