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Mix & Match Vegan Cupcakes: Vanilla Maple Walnut

• October 2016
• Recipes

Vanilla cupcakes are always delicious and you can frost them with any type of frosting. You can also play with this basic recipe and invent interesting things, like chai cupcakes or cinnamon cupcakes…. This maple walnut frosting gives them a perfect touch of delicate maple sweetness offset by the very slight bitterness of walnuts, so I love it! You can also frost these cupcakes with the chocolate mousse frosting from the Chocolate Chocolate Mousse cupcakes, if you love the classic vanilla/chocolate combo.

Vanilla cupcakes

1 1/4 cups organic unbleached flour
3/4 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup almond or soy milk
2 tsp white or apple cider vinegar
1/3 cup safflower or canola oil
1/2 cup dry sweetener (I like coconut palm sugar)
2 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 350 and line your muffin tin with paper liners or reusable silicone liners. You can also grease the tin if you don’t mind more clean-up.

Put the almond or soy milk in a large glass measuring cup (a 2 cup pyrex works great) and stir in the vinegar, let it sit a couple of minutes to curdle. In a medium bowl, beat the oil and sugar together and then add in the vanilla and then the curdled almond milk. Stir in the baking powder, soda and salt, and then gradually stir in the flour. Whisk it until it’s smooth. Fill the baking cups about 2/3 full and bake for about 20 minutes (you can check that a toothpick comes out clean).

Cool the cupcakes well before frosting (it’s okay if you have to eat some, but remember they taste their best when they are not warm).

Maple Walnut Frosting

2/3 cup organic refined (unflavored) coconut oil, softened
1/4 to 1/3 cup maple syrup depending on your sweet tooth
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/8 tsp sea salt
1/3 cup soy or rice milk powder
1 cup walnuts

Put all the ingredients in a food processor except the walnuts, and blend well. Then add the walnuts and blend until the frosting is well blended and creamy, but be careful–if you blend the walnuts too long the oil will separate (yes, I have done this…. so you don’t have to 🙂
If you feel the frosting is too soft, you can add 1/2 tsp of finely ground chia seeds (you can grind them in a coffee grinder).

Use a pastry bag with a large icing tip to ice the cupcakes. This frosting is actually pretty healthy, so feel free to pile high 🙂 If you don’t have an icing bag yet (but I bet you’ll get one after a few rounds of cupcake baking), you can scoop the frosting into a ziplock bag and cut off the corner, and this works great too.