Double Chocolate Cupcakes Recipe (gluten free, dairy free, sugar free, but delicious)

16Sep12

Today we have a guest post from one of the other Diggers! Enjoy!!  – E.

Cupcakes prettily prepared for Baby Digger’s Shower

So, as someone who loves sweets and baked goods, going gluten free has been, a struggle. But since I started doing my own baking, with recipes, without recipes, it’s been easier. By now, I have learned some keys things when doing gluten free baking, and I’ll list some tips below.

Because I have many dairy-free/vegan friends, and because my roommate Emily is against sugar (cash crop, unhealthy, imported, “and they usually tear down rainforests to put in palm sugar plantations” says Emily), my baking is also increasingly dairy and sugar free. The answer, friends, is MAPLE SYRUP. Preferably Amber maple syrup from local producers.

This recipe below was something I made up, going off my new baking instincts.

Ingredients:
– 2 cups sorghum flour
-1/2 cup cocoa powder (make sure it’s a good one, without dairy and flour)
-1/4 cup dark chocolate chips 
-1 tsp baking soda
-1 tsp xanthum gum
-3 dashes salt (1/2 tsp)
-1/2 tsp cinnamon

-1 cup unsweetened rice milk (I used almond milk once and I think it was too heavy and made the cupcakes thicker)
-2 tsp white vinegar 
-1/4 cup canola oil (or sunflower oil, or vegetable oil)
-3/4 cup real maple syrup 
– ½ cup soda water (the bubbles help the batter rise)

Tools:
-measuring things
-electric hand blender (or egg beater)
-muffin tray (makes a dozen)

Steps:
1. Preheat oven at 375 degrees fahrenheit.
2. Brush muffin tray with canola oil.
3. Mix together wet ingredients (add soda water last)
4. Mix together dry ingredients
5. Mix all together. Use an electric hand blender if you have one. Or, beat the batter with haste, with an egg beater. Beat for 1-2 minutes.
6. Scoop batter into tray, about an inch high.
7. Bake for 15-25 minutes. The top of the cupcakes will crack, and if it still looks like chocolate lava inside, cook longer. You can poke a fork or toothpick into a fault line and if it comes out dry, it’s done.
8. Cool. Take out gently with a spoon.
9. Accessorize with mango slices and mint sprigs if you are going to a garden-themed baby shower.
10. Eat. 
TIPS

Some gluten-free baking tips in general, and if you are turning a wheat flour recipe into a gluten free one.

– Most recipes call for baking soda. Not all call for vinegar. It’s grade 5 people. Together, they rise. Like lava. Add 2 tsp of vinegar per tsp of baking soda.
– Soda water. It’s bubbly and helps your batter rise. Substitute half of whatever liquid the recipe calls for with soda water.
– Electric hand beater! It aerates! It’s great.
– Taste the batter before you cook it. If the batter tastes gross, fix it. Unless you are using Bob’s all purpose gluten free flours, which use like fava bean flour which takes gross raw no matter what. But when it cooks the bitter taste goes away.
– I like sorghum flour and buckwheat flour the best in general. If you add a little bit (1/4 cup) of starch (corn starch, tapioca starch) it helps to stick. So does using xanthum gum or guar gum. 
– Don’t let batters sit after you mix them. Pour and cook them right away or all the bubblies escape.

Next, gluten free bread! Sometime.

Filed under: Gluten-free, Local, Recipes, Vegan   |  2 Comments