A paleo lemon almond snack cake with almond flour and sweet spices that’s perfect for breakfast, snack, or any time!
When I picked Drew up at school and told him I’d made a cake, but without frosting, he wasn’t exactly thrilled, as you might imagine. He’s 4 after all, and all cakes have frosting or else why the hell even bother, right? Well, we discussed this in depth, because that’s what parents and preschoolers do all day long – discuss the intricacies and wonders of this scary world we live in that sometimes omits frosting – I could write a whole post on this but I’ll spare you, at least for now.
Anyway, we came to the conclusion that the lack of frosting made this a “snack cake”, not a “dessert cake” as in your typical buttercream birthday cake. We generally don’t eat frosting on our snacks so putting it in this category works. I asked myself repeatedly during the 15 minute discussion why I didn’t just make this recipe in muffin cups to avoid all the drama. But I think this was a good lesson on being flexible and eating “cake” without frosting sometimes.
Of course he announced to the girls when they got home “mommy made a cake! But it has NO FROSTING! IT’S A SNACK!” You seriously just cannot predict what will pop out as the “theme of the day” with three kids. But, thanks to Drew, a name for this recipe was born and the drama was worth it.
A bit more about this snack cake – it’s paleo, sweetened with organic coconut sugar, and jazzed up with cinnamon and ginger, so you won’t miss the frosting at all. Okay look, don’t tell my kids but I’m sure you can top it with any sort of frosting you want and it will be fabulous. As if you needed my permission 😉
Lemon Almond Snack Cake
Ingredients
- 2 cups blanched almond flour
- 1/3 cup tapioca starch
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/8 tsp salt
- 3 eggs
- 3/4 cup organic coconut sugar
- 3 tbsp coconut oil melted and cooled slightly
- 2 tbsp fresh squeezed lemon juice
- 1 tsp ground ginger
- 1/2 tsp ground allspice
- 1 and 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
Instructions
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Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and grease an 8 x 8 inch baking dish lightly with coconut oil
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In a medium bowl, combine the almond flour, tapioca, baking soda, and salt and set aside.
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In a larger bowl, combine the eggs, coconut sugar, coconut oil, lemon juice, ginger, allspice and cinnamon and beat well
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Slowly stir the dry ingredients into the wet to fully combine.
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Transfer the mixture to the prepare baking dish, and bake in the preheated oven for 20-25 minutes or until the top is lightly browned and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
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Let cool, then cut into squares and enjoy!
As a side note that’s not recipe related at all, I JUST realized it’s easy to edit photos to add text and graphics with a website like Pic Monkey. I might be the stupidest blogger of all bloggers ever to blog but I am just starting to catch on to so many of these “techie” things and still have no clue what I’m doing most of the time.
Do you like that I put text on my first photo ever on this blog? I actually picked the font without consciously realizing it’s the same one my theme uses. At least I’m consistent in my taste? Forget that it’s like three words, I am still feeling very odd and self conscious about the whole thing, what the hell is wrong with me? And didn’t I just ask you guys that three days ago?
Do you consider cake without frosting cake at all or am I way off base?
What’s one topic your kids have insisted discussing in depth that has made you feel crazy?
Do you like “decorating” your online photos? What do you use to do this?
Hi! I'm Michele. Paleo eater and recipe creator, runner, and mom of 3. Welcome to my blog, where we obsess over all of it and love every minute! (It's way fun over here, promise.) Stay a while to eat, run, and rant with me! 
I love using pic monkey! I think I learned about it when I first started blogging. I don’t use it to edit so much as to make collages or add text to pictures
Recipe looks good! Nice save with making it a “snack cake” vs “dessert cake”…that actually makes alot of sense plus it would make me feel better about eating it at any time of day:)
Better late than never for me I guess 🙂 And this is good to eat any time!
I remember when I first discovered all the wonders I could do with pic monkey… I felt so silly that I didn’t realise I could do it before! Haha!
And a cake that’s moist and juicy definitely does not need frosting, frosting is only needed on a bland and boring sponge – hence why most only eat the frosting!
I am way late but not surprising given my lack of tech knowledge 🙂 And this cake is so good without!
LOVE pic monkey! It makes me feel like I know what I am doing lol. It’s a great editing program if you ask me…Cake totally needs frosting but when I make snack cakes, they don’t have frosting so there is clearly a difference. Do you know there’s a new naked wedding cake trend? No frosting. I don’t get it!
Oh I totally have no clue what I’m doing on the internet and just barely feel my way around! Naked wedding cake sounds a little bit sad! Weddings and birthdays call for frosting!
I may have the only kids in the world that doesn’t like frosting. So, cake without frosting is still cake 🙂
Your recipe looks delicious Michele!
Thank you! One of my daughter’s doesn’t love frosting, she’s also my most “paleo” so not surprising 🙂
Um, yum. Sometimes I think of frostingless cakes as cake like breads. But I think that if there is enough sweetness and a certain spongy quality, it can easily still be a cake!
Basically a quick bread, or coffee cake I think would be the same thing. But snack cake is a bit more kid friendly 🙂
That’s funny your picture label was the first thing I noticed! You definite want to label or watermark otherwise people steal them. Recipe sound delicious and can I used your kids to tell me what to call my recipes? It sounds like you have a blog team you need to tap into more!
I thought for some reason it was complicated to do that, clearly I’m late on all things involving computers and internet 🙂 And funny because they do like naming recipes, but that’s about it. They also like when their pictures show up on the blog 🙂
haha yes i love the font, but i love the sound of these bars more! GIMME!
Thanks! They are yummy 🙂
Looks delicious! What is your favorite almond flour to use for recipes like this?
I use Bob Red Mill’s blanched almond flour, I’ve actually never used another brand, I like it a lot. And thank you!
Haha. I love that cake without frosting = a snack… I feel like I should use this more frequently to justify dessert being a snack, and not a dessert : ) I used to consider any cake (ginger cake, lemon cake) cake/dessert even though it didn’t have frosting but I really like Drew’s interpretation!
You can totally eat it whenever if there’s no frosting. Like for breakfast, there is no reason not to 🙂
Haha, I never understood snack cake. It seemed like a sweet quick bread to me. Regardless any sweet bready baked good is a winner!
Yup, that’s exactly what it is, but snack cake sounds more fun I guess 🙂
Confession: I actually prefer the cake part to the frosting, so a snack cake sound just perfect to me. I think you could have called it a coffee cake, too, but I’m not sure that would fly with your kids since they wouldn’t be eating it with coffee 😉 And PicMonkey is bomb. It’s what I use to make collages and add text to my photos, too.
It’s totally a coffee cake but snack cake goes over better with the kids! And I’m way late to PicMonkey but at least I found out now 🙂
This looks amazing!!! I just started making almond meal since we have lots of almonds, and the store charges a lot for it. Anyway his looks perfect. I’m a frosting gal but I would dig this, although making a frosting using coconut cream and coconut oil is crossing my mind lol. Always a food rebel.
I have never tried putting words on pics so THANK YOU!! I will try pic monkey for sure. Happy Friday Michele!!
That’s awesome that you make your own, I’m impressed! I’m sure you’d make a fabulous frosting to go with this 🙂
Alas, I have a love/hate relationship with PicMonkey. It is really fun, but it always crashes on me at least once when I use it. I feel like this only happens to me though! Have a great weekend!
I couldn’t say as I’ve only used it once, we’ll see! Thanks and you too!
My boys would love these! You should try out the website Canva. Sort of like picmonkey but WAY better!
I’ll try that out too, thanks!
I’m not a cake person or a frosting person. I love all other junk food though. The thing that ALL of our kids love talking about? Drugs. The oldest (he’s 14) insists on educating everyone about which drugs are made of what and do what and how you take them. It’s great and everything, like, I guess knowledge is power or whatever but sometimes I’m like, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD JAKE STOP TALKING ABOUT DRUGS. And then our 8 year old boy will say the word “boobies” and then I’m really wishing we could talk about the deadly effects of cocaine.
Oh man you guys have interesting convos over there 🙂 it only gets better as they grow I guess!
I love anything with lemon so this is a winner in my book, with or without frosting.
PicMonkey is the bomb. I use it for all my photo editing and recipe collages. I’m glad you found it although I’d like to make one suggestion. The text is a great idea, and I didn’t notice it in the picture until you mentioned it. It kind of melts right into the background and you want it to stand out and be seen and heard. Sometimes (more often than not I forgot) I try to photography my pics and leave a little blank space at the top without any food. That’s where I try to add my text. Nice job by the way. Keep on improving, you’re doing awesome.
Thanks Meghan! Now I’m going to have to look at your photos for inspiration. It always takes me so long to get the hang of tech things!
Cake without frosting seems like something is missing … but it does make it easier to snack on, so there’s that…
Haha, that’s enough for me 🙂
u know….i am not ure i ever made a cake without frosting : )
though i guess banana bread is pretty much cake with no frosting based on the ingredients. i was thinking though…no frosting means i get to have a least 2 pieces and call it one serving right ?
Banana bread is totally like cake! This is like a coffee cake or quick bread really. And yes it means multiple servings are just fine 🙂
I follow a low fodmap diet. I didn’t think almond flour was ok. The cake sounds great but I’m leery of the almonds. Thoughts?
Thanks Michele…..just found your site!
Almonds are considered medium I believe, some people might have issues but I haven’t found almond flour to bother me, say, if I eat a serving of a muffin. Everyone is different, and I’ve found that amounts matter too. Glad you found me! I have many low FODMAP recipes and all are paleo, but not all low FODMAP. Many can be adapted though!