Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Vegan MoFo - V is for Vanilla Slice


Several times on my blog I have mentioned that I don't have much of a sweet tooth, although if I see something smothered in passionfruit icing it's more likely to get my attention. A vanilla slice posted by Cindy from Where's the Beef and K from In the Mood for Noodles about a year ago was exactly this type of sweet.

Vanilla slice was always a favourite treat for the man and son. They would frequently be tempted by these sweets that commonly appear in bakeries. This recipe had been sitting in my bookmarks for way too long so I took the opportunity to try it out for the letter V.

It's quite easy to put together, the puff pastry sheets are lightly browned, a custard is made, the slice is assembled, refrigerated and topped with icing a few hours later. The only issue I ran into was running out of cornflour but I had some rice flour in the pantry to make up the difference.

It's quite surprising that I am the only one in the house to have sampled the slice so far but I know that my boys will adore it. I thought it tasted just like a vanilla slice should even though it has been such a long time since I have actually eaten one.


Click here to see my A - Z of Vegan MoFo posts.


Vanilla Slice (Adapted from Where's the Beef and In the Mood for Noodles, originally sourced from IVU)

2 sheets frozen puff pastry, defrosted

Filling

1 cup castor sugar
1/2 cup cornflour
1/4 cup rice flour
1/2 cup custard powder
1 litre soy milk
3 tablespoons dairy-free margarine
2 teaspoons vanilla essence

Icing

2 cups icing sugar
1 teaspoon dairy-free margarine
pulp from 2 passionfruits
2-3 teaspoons water

Heat an oven to 200C. Cook the puff pastry sheets on trays lined with baking paper for about 6 minutes, until lightly browned. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.

In a saucepan, combine the sugar, cornflour and custard powder. Add about a cup of soy milk and whisk thoroughly ensuring there are no lumps. Whisk in the rest of the soy milk and margarine. Heat the custard over medium, stirring all the time to ensure that there no lumps. The custard will eventually become very thick which is when you need to turn off the heat and add the vanilla.

Cut one of the pastry sheets to fit your baking dish and place gently in the bottom of the dish. Spread the custard evenly over the top. Cut the second pastry sheet to size and place on top of the custard, then press it down gently so it sticks to the custard. Place in the refrigerator for a few hours.

To make the icing, place the icing sugar in a bowl and add the passionfruit pulp and margarine. Mix together and add teaspoons of water slowly, stirring as you go, until a thick but spreadable paste results. If the icing ends up too runny, add some more icing sugar. Spread the icing over the top of the pastry evenly. Return the slice to the fridge in order for the icing to set.

9 comments:

  1. I want that piece,deglutened of course. I really should try to adapt it further. Hope the boys love it!

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  2. Oh, yum. I've been wondering what exactly constitutes a "slice" as a dessert... your post convinced me to finally look it up. :D

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  3. Your slice looks perfect! I think the passionfruit icing is what I love most about vanilla slice.

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  4. This looks like it could belong in a bakery - and vanilla slice is one thing I would never have thought to veganise, so I'm surprised looking at your ingredients that it seems quite doable. Thank you :)

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  5. Yep, I think the passionfruit icing is the killer temptation here! Glad you enjoyed it as much as we did, and I hope your boys will too.

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  6. I still have it bookmarked - and am lucky enough to have sampled it at a potluck (unless it was just in a really nice dream - my memory is vague) and love it - yours looks great and am interested that you used rice flour when you ran out of cornflour - would never think to do that

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  7. Vanilla slice is one of my favourite pastries - these are gonna be made sometime in my near future.
    <:-)

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  8. K, the boys adored it and were fighting over the last piece so it was a huge success. You should try a GF version one day.

    coldandsleepy, I'm not sure if would be classed as a dessert. I have a silly habit of calling sweet things desserts.

    Mandee, passionfruit icing is such a wonderful thing.

    Kari, vanilla slice doesn't really sound like it could be vegan friendly but these ingredients prove that it can be done quite easily.

    Cindy, the boys loved it so much and so did other family members that dropped in over the weekend.

    Johanna, you should make it someday. I only thought to use rice flour as I had seen options for using cornflour or rice flour in a recipe recently.

    Jeni Treehugger, I hope you give this a try!

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  9. Vanilla slice is a favourite of mine and this veganized version sounds really good!!

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