Whatever the reason for choosing a vegan lifestyle may be, finding good quality food is still tough. To combat this a lot of us take to creating our own treats and meals at home as it allows us to have full control over what we are eating.
The one food I really missed when I cut out gluten and lactose were cakes. As you start checking the labels on foods you notice that everything seems to contain gluten and milk. Finally, and almost by accident, I found a recipe in a book for a mincemeat cupcake which just happened to be lactose and gluten-free. None of the ingredients were swapped it was just a great recipe.
Over time I have tweaked this recipe to create what, for me, is the perfect basic cupcake recipe that makes a great treat on its own, or a great jumping-off point if you want to experiment and add different flavors to it.
You can easily add vanilla essence, mix in fruit or add cocoa powder to the recipe to turn it into the treats you prefer. I use gluten-free flour, but there is no reason you can’t use normal flour too if gluten isn’t an issue for you.
This recipe will yield: 12 muffins sized cakes/24 mini cupcakes or 16 or so normal cupcakes.
You Will Need
- 350g self-raising flour (gluten-free if desired)
- 1tea spoon Baking Powder
- 135ml Sunflower Oil
- 375ml Water
- 1tbsp demerara sugar
- 1 1/2 tsp vanilla essence
- Other flavors of your choice if preferred
Step 1:
Preheat your oven. 190 or thereabouts is fine. Or Gas Mark 5.
Step 2:
Line your tins or cases. Silicon cases say they don’t need to be buttered or lined, but in my experience they do. Put this all to one side.
Step 3:
Grab a large mixing bowl and sieve together the baking powder and flour. Give it a little mix with a hand whisk for good measure.
Add in your caster sugar and give it another mix.
Next, you want to get the rest of your dry ingredients and add the sugar and mix well.
Step 4:
Now you’ll want to mix together and add your wet ingredients. As you mix it together and give it a good whisk/mix you should see it come together to form a nice reasonably thick batter like the mix. At this stage, you can also add your vanilla essence if you like. If you are using food coloring this is also the stage to add it into the mix.
This mixture will rise pretty well so fill your cases about one half to a third full.
For cooking times I do these in a mini cupcake machine and they take about 7-10 minutes. In an oven, they will take around 10-12 but you’ll want to keep an eye on them and grab them at the right moment.
Muffin sized cakes will take around 18minutes again, check them with a bit of uncooked spaghetti or a skewer to see if the middle is cooked through (it should come out clean)
Let them cook for 5 minutes in the tin, and transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely.
You can treat these as you would any other cupcake, so add icing, cream, or whatever else takes your fancy.
Gluten-Free Almond and Coconut Cake
Recipe of the Month is this delicious Almond and Coconut cake- gluten-free! Put this easy recipe to the test!
Ingredients:
- 1/2tsp vanilla essence
- 120g desiccated coconut
- 370g almond meal
- A pinch salt
- 520g of caster sugar
- 8 eggs; beaten
- 200g of butter, melted and cooled
- Flaked almonds
Instructions:
1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees.
2. Line a 1/2 size chafing dish with baking paper (24cm x 30cm x 6cm).
2. Mix the coconut, almond, salt, and sugar together.
3. Beat eggs with butter and vanilla until light in color and fluffy with an electric mixer (whisk).
4. Mix all the wet ingredients with the dry ingredients.
5. Simply pour into a lined tin and cook at 180 degrees for approximately 30 minutes.
Enjoy!