Recipe: Vegan mini chocolate cupcakes

Credit: The Vegan Project

Vegans and non-vegans alike will go gaga for these mini mouthfuls of chocolate joy

This is one of our friend Alicia Katz’s favourite holiday recipes from Epicurious.com. Alicia made this recipe vegan by using egg replacer and vegan sugar.

>> Find more vegan holiday baking recipes from The Vegan Project

Ingredients

1/3 cup water

1/3 cup pitted dates, coarsely chopped

1/4 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder (dairy-free)

1 oz fine-quality bittersweet chocolate (not unsweetened, dairy-free), coarsely chopped

3 tbsp packed vegan brown sugar

Egg replacer for one egg

1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

pinch of salt

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

vegetable oil cooking spray

1 tsp vegan confectioners sugar for dusting (or make your own by pulverizing vegan sugar into powder using a food processor or coffee grinder)

1 mini muffin pan and 12 mini paper muffin cups

Preheat oven to 325° F.

Bring water and dates just to a boil in a saucepan. Transfer mixture to a food processor and add cocoa powder and chocolate, pulsing once to combine. Let cool two minutes, then add brown sugar, egg replacer, vanilla, baking soda and a pinch of salt. Puree until smooth. Add flour and pulse until just incorporated.

Spray muffin cups with cooking spray. Spoon batter into cups, dividing evenly, and bake in middle of oven until a wooden pick comes out clean, 18–22 minutes. Cool cupcakes in pan 10 minutes, then turn out onto a rack and cool completely. Just before serving, sprinkle tops lightly with confectioners sugar.

The Vegan Project’s Jessica Grajcyzk and Bridget Burns are passionate about health, the environment and the treatment of animals, and are learning about what it means to be vegan while documenting their experiences on their blog. The Vegan Project website is in development and will be a resource for people who want to try veganism in Vancouver. Email The Vegan Project if you’d like to learn more about what they do and/or going vegan.