Maple Bacon, Lavender Honey, and Orange Zested with Chocolate Ganache Cupcakes

Hi Everyone!

It's been forever since I've posted something, or even been on here. I now have 60 followers which is mind blowing to me. Thanks for all sticking around!

Although these aren't all vegan, they can easily be made vegan with fakin bacon and no honey. The bases of these are still vegan! I was lucky enough to find an entire bouquet of fresh lavender at Whole Foods to make these, so now I have a lot of extra buds to dry out for future baking.
These altogether took me about 4.5 hours to make, so only bake these when you have some time! Enjoy!

Here are the recipes:

Maple Bacon Cupcakes:

1/2 cup soy milk
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
2/4 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup all purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup of bacon grease (yes, seriously)

Once it's all blended, put evenly distribute the batter into the baking cups. Put a few pieces of bacon in the middle of each cupcake.

Brown Sugar Bacon:

Lay bacon out on a baking pan and broil on high for 5 minutes. Take it out, generously pile brown sugar on each piece and broil for another 5 minutes. Watch it carefully so the brown sugar doesn't burn the bacon and fill your kitchen with smoke. Oops.

Bake at 350 for 18-20 minutes
Take out, set to cool.

Maple Butter cream:

1/2 cup earth balance
1/4 cup brown sugar
3 1/2 cup confectioners' sugar
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup maple syrup

Use a piping bag to put the frosting on the cupcakes, and garnish each one with a piece of maple bacon.


Lavender Honey Cupcakes:

1/2 cup soy milk
1/2 cup lavender simple syrup
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
3/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup vegetable
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup all purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

Mix all ingredients together
Bake at 350 for 18 minutes, take out and set to cool.

Lavender Simple Syrup:

1 cup water
2 cups sugar
1/4 cup fresh or dried lavender buds

Put the water and sugar together in a pot on high for 5 minutes. Add the lavender buds and stir together. Keep it on simmer for 10 minutes but watch it carefully because if it gets too hot it will start to turn into lavender candy. Do not let it boil!

Let the syrup cool in the refrigerator. Once it's cooled put the syrup in a food processor so the buds will mix with the syrup. (You can also use this syrup for tea!)

Honey Butter Cream:

1/2 cup earth balance
1/2 cup shortening
3 1/2 cup confectioners' sugar
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup honey

I frosted the cupcakes with a knife instead of piping it only because it was really hot in my kitchen and my frosting wouldn't stay stiff. It ended up working out just fine anyways. Garnish each cupcake with a lavender bud!

Orange Zested Cupcakes:

1/2 cup soy milk
1/2 cup fresh squeezed orange juice
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
3/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup vegetable
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup all purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon orange zest

Orange Chocolate Ganache:

1/2 fresh squeezed orange juice
1 table spoon orange zest
2 1/2 cups semisweet vegan chocolate chips

Over low to medium heat, combine the soy milk and the chocolate chips in a sauce pan and keep mixing it until they mix together.

Once this is cooled off a bit (but still melty) put about a teaspoon of this over each cupcake and spread it around until it covers most, or all of the top.

I tried to make candied orange peels to garnish for the tops of these, but it didn't turn out so well. I ended up following a recipe to make orange peel candy, and not candied orange peels which resulted in a pot of charred orange candy and a kitchen full of smoke. (the pot survived)

Happy Baking :)

Fall is here!

Fall is the best season for baking. I went apple picking twice last week and I've been baking and cooking pretty much every day since. My friend Jeremy is on tour from California and I baked him some apple cinnamon muffins this morning before he hit the road. Here's the recipe!:

Cinnamon Apple Muffins:

1 cup soy milk
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
3/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup canola oil
2 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cup all purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 tbsp cinnamon
1/3 cup chopped apples


I sprinkled cinnamon sugar on the top before I put them in the oven to bake. It leaves them with a thin glazed crust on the top.

Bake at 350 for 18-20 minutes
Take out, set to cool.

You can check out Jeremy's band and tour dates here:
http://www.myspace.com/toucheamore



Happy Baking! :)

Chocolate Orange, Ginger Lemon, PBJ and Cookies!

I was baking the other day and made my friend pose for a picture showing his awesome OG Black Flag shirt. I baked Chocolate Orange, Ginger Lemon, PBJ cupcakes and chocolate chip cookies. I can post all recipes except for the cookies because the recipe is my sisters that I'm not allowed to share, unfortunately. Here they are!:

Chocolate Orange:

1/2 cup soy milk
1/2 cup orange juice
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
3/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup all purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 tbsp orange zest
1/4 teaspoon salt

Bake at 350 for 18-20 minutes, take out and set to cool

Chocolate Ganache:

1 cup of vegan chocolate chips
1/2 cup soy milk

Over low to medium heat, combine the soy milk and the chocolate chips in a sauce pan and keep mixing it until they mix together.

Once this is cooled off a bit (but still melty) put about a teaspoon of this over each cupcake and spread it around until it covers most, or all of the top.


Ginger Lemon Cupcakes:


1/2 cup soy milk
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
3/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup all purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tsp of ground ginger
zest from 1 lemon (squeeze some of the juice in too!)

Bake at 350 for 18-20 minutes. Take out, set to cool.

Ginger Lemon Butter cream Frosting:

1/2 cup earth balance
1/2 cup shortening
3 1/2 cup confectioners' sugar
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup soy milk
1/2 tsp ground ginger
zest from 1 lemon

I also chopped up crystallized ginger and put it in the frosting, and then decorated each cupcake with a piece of the ginger, too.


As for the PBJ cupcakes, I've baked them a handful of times. The recipe should be in my blog at least twice already!

Thanks for reading and Happy Baking! :)

Happy New Year!

After about 3 months of barely updating my blog at all, I'm hitting the kitchen tonight to bake some goodies finally! You know it's been a long time since you've baked when you have to go to your own blog to look up your own recipe for the cupcakes you bake...haha absurd. But lucky for you, you will have two new cupcake recipes to bake up! Check back tomorrow to see what I have up my sleeve.

Happy Baking!

Edge Day

I made Xed up cupcakes for the Pre-Edge Day show this year. The whole weekend was awesome. These are just simple chocolate and vanilla cupcakes with vanilla butter cream frosting on top, and I mixed food coloring for the black X.

A day with the coolest people I know, and Nutella

Finally an update! I misplaced my memory card reader to upload pictures and I just found it today.
Anyways,
This was back on October 7th. I headed over to my Aunt and Uncles house for the day to bake my Uncles favorite baked goods for his birthday. We baked him a cake with pure Nutella frosting (amazing/disgusting idea, I know) and hazelnut cupcakes with Nutella frosting. Although Nutella isn't vegan, there is a vegan alternative that is called "Simple Soynut Butter" that you can use for this recipe. Over all, this day was spent with two of the coolest people I know listening to Black Flag, This is Boston Not L.A., and eating good food.

Here is the recipe:

Hazelnut Cupcakes:

1/2 cup soy milk
2 1/2 tsp hazelnut extract
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
3/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup all purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

Bake at 350 for 18-20 minutes. Take out, set to cool.

Hazelnut Chocolate Nutella Frosting:

1/2 cup earth balance
1/2 cup shortening
3 1/2 cup confectioners' sugar
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup soy milk
1 tbsp hazelnut extract
1/3 cup vegan nutella

I would suggest chopping up hazelnuts and putting some on each cupcake

Happy Baking!

Updates

Hello Everyone!

Sorry about not updating recently. I moved into the city a few weeks ago and I'm still getting situated and everything. Hopefully I'll be baking in no time.

Other news: This weekend there was a hardcore fest in Boston that I went to. My roommate let a group of friends stay over and I recognized one of them as someone who reads my blog. His name is Kwame, and he's awesome. I was wicked excited to meet someone who regularly reads this. Unfortunately we were not able to bake up a storm together. Next time we run into each other I'm sure we will be to our necks in baked goods.


Hi Kwame!


Keep checking back,
Claire