A decadent moist Snickers cake inspired by the candy bar. Vanilla cake with peanut butter swirls, topped with date caramel, melted chocolate and peanuts! Glutenfree option
In a large bowl, mix the dry ingredients and set aside.
In another large bowl, add all the wet ingredients for the cake and mix really well until the sugar is combined. Add the wet ingredients into the dry, mixing well until until you have a smooth batter.
You can mix the chocolate chips, peanuts, and melted peanut butter into the cake batter right now and swirl them a little bit. Or you can do it after pouring this batter into the baking dish. Line an 8x8-inch or 9x9-inch baking pan with parchment paper, and pour the batter into the baking dish.
Melt the peanut butter if you haven't already in the microwave or in a saucepan in a double boiler. Add the peanuts and the chocolate chips to the batter, and swirl those in. Then, add dollops of the melted peanut butter, and swirl it into the batter with a toothpick or a chopstick.
Bake for 32 to 37 minutes. The time depends on the baking dish you're using as well as your oven.
In the meantime, make the date caramel:
Soak the dates for 15 minutes in hot water and then drain and remove the pits. Add the dates to a blender along with the rest of the caramel ingredients, and then blend. Blend for a minute, then let the mixture sit for 3-4 minutes for the dates to soften further and then blend again until the mixture is smooth.
Taste and adjust the flavor. If you want it sweeter, you can add in a tablespoon of sugar.
Top the cake:
Once the cake is done baking, remove the cake from the oven, let it cool for 5 minutes and then remove it from the baking dish using your parchment paper, and then let it cool for another 15 minutes or so.
In the meantime, melt the chocolate. Add the coconut cream to a small skillet over medium heat. Once the cream is melted, add the chocolate. Mix for half a second, then switch off the heat, mixing the chocolate in the hot coconut cream until the mixture is well melted and smooth.
Once the cake is cool enough and somewhat room temperature, drizzle the date caramel all over the cake and spread it out. Then, drop some of the melted chocolate over the top of the caramel. You can drizzle it on or just put dollops of the melted chocolate and then swirl it into the date caramel.
Top the cake with the remaining 2 tablespoons of peanuts, and chill for 15-20 minutes before serving. Or you can serve it right now, because it's going to be super irresistible
Store on the counter for just an hour or so, then refrigerate or freeze in a closed container. Warm in the microwave and serve. You can directly microwave it from frozen, microwave 20-40 seconds or until soft.
You can also slice the cake into two cake layers before topping, so that you have two layers of the date caramel and chocolate swirl. Put the second layer on top, and then top it with even more date caramel, chocolate, and peanuts.
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Notes
To make this peanut free, you can use roasted cashews and cashew butter.To make this without dates, make your favorite vegan caramel recipe with sugar and use that instead.To make this gluten-free, use a mix of 3/4 cups almond flour, 3/4 cup oat flour, 1/3 cup of potato starch and mix really well. Use all of this mixture, and then for the wet ingredients, use 3/4 cup non-dairy milk and 1/4 cup of club soda, carbonated water, or other fizzy drink. Make the batter and bake.