At Muse, we only serve organic foods and because of this, students are asked not to bring outside food onto the campus. When birthdays role around the kitchen bakes special treats for each student to share with his or her class. As you can imagine, with 150 students we wind up doing a lot of baking! This is the vanilla cupcake recipe we have adapted which is vegan and gluten free, making it universally friendly even for students with allergies or food restrictions. Looks pretty tasty, right?
Vegan-Gluten Free Cupcakes
Makes 2 dozen mini cupcakes
1 1/2 cups gluten free flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
8 TB Earth Balance butter substitute, softened
1 cup cane sugar
3 TB ground Flax seed, mixed with 9 TB water
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 cup rice milk
-Preheat oven to 350F.
-In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream the Earth Balance and sugar until light and fluffy. Add in the flaxseed and water mixture slowly. Set aside.
-In a large bowl, sift the flour, baking powder and salt. Mix the wet mixture into the dry and add the vanilla extract and rice milk. Stir the mixture until well combined.
-Portion the batter into mini muffin pans lined with recycled baking cups. You should have about 24 cupcakes.
-Bake 10-15 minutes until golden brown and set in the center. Determine doneness by inserting a toothpick into the center of one of the cupcakes. If it comes out clean, they are ready. Allow to cool at least 20 minutes before frosting.
