Today I’m celebrating cupcake Friday with Vegan Vanilla Dulce De (Non) Leche Filled Cupcakes with Vanilla Buttercream and Salted Caramel Topping.

Bet you can’t say that two times fast.

Well hello there, cupcake army!

I love filled cupcakes!

You can get the full story on these yummy cupcakes, plus the recipe I used for the vegan caramel sauce (“liquid gold”) at the Sugared Bakery site.  The recipe is totally worth the trip over there.  You’ll never know that it’s vegan, and I won’t even tell anyone if you pour it over your ice cream.

Scandalous.

Are you celebrating Cupcake Friday today??!!  Tell me about it!

]]> http://www.joggerslife.com/2011/cupcake-friday-2/feed/ 11 http://www.joggerslife.com/2011/cupcake-thursday/ http://www.joggerslife.com/2011/cupcake-thursday/#comments Thu, 03 Feb 2011 11:00:33 +0000 http://www.joggerslife.com/?p=4531

So, just in case you missed my nonchalant announcement the other day, today is the first weekly Cupcake Thursday installment.  Don’t be upset if you don’t have a cupcake today.  Next week I’m confident that you’ll be more prepared.

In an effort to continue honing my cupcakery skills, I’ve decided to make cupcakes at a minimum of once a week on Thursdays.  Despite the fact that I had worked a full day yesterday, then trucked it over to the gym for a 60 minute spin class after work, I was still excited about making cupcakes so close to bedtime.

That’s love.

Luckily for these chocolate chocolate cupcakes (with a white chocolate swirl), they didn’t cut into my sleep time.  If they had, we might have had a big problem.

Now, let’s just pretend for a moment that I didn’t inadvertently leave fingerprint evidence on this poor little cupcake’s  Sugared Bakery heart.

As long as we’re in the mood to be visionaries, I know it’s hard to imagine, but let’s just pretend that this…

Actually still looks like this…

Because the knowledge that I unknowingly fed my beloved Wilton 1M piping tip to the garbage disposal is just too much to bear at this juncture.  It is also the reason why today’s cupcakes are frosted in such a “Hostess” fashion–I didn’t have my coveted 1M.  Because I threw it away.  And turned on the garbage disposal.  And heard it being murdered.  And fished it out.  And cried.

So, let’s pretend none of that ever happened, and the buttercream looks all pretty and swirly like it’s supposed to.

Something you don’t have to pretend?  The fact that these cupcakes will be gone before you can say “vegan buttercream”.

Feel free to celebrate Cupcake Thursday with me.  Today is a lovely day to eat a cupcake, just in case you needed an excuse.

Did you know that I’m in the process of starting a little bakery?  Did you also know what an arduous process it is to open a business?  It’s crazy.  I’ve had some experience starting businesses at my current “big girl job”, but I’ve always had the luxury of handing things over to an attorney at the point when things get tricky.  In my real life, not so much.

‘Google’ is the new ‘attorney’.

The process of starting a business is very exciting, especially when it’s something that I’ve had a burning desire to accomplish for the past 30 years of my life.  I’ve always wanted to be a chef or a baker.  Always.  Ask my Mom, she’ll tell you about my endless hours in the kitchen learning how to bake.  What she probably won’t tell you is about the time when my friend and I fell into a heap on the floor laughing, because reducing a recipe by 1/2 was just too complicated.

(“what the hail is 1/2 of 2/3???!!!”)

Incidentally, math is not my forte.

Incidentally, that aforementioned “big girl job”–is an accountant.  Now that’s enough to make me fall on the floor laughing.

Because it’s always been my dream, I didn’t mind staying up until 3AM packing glitter puff cookies in their customized packages for Sugared Bakery‘s first job ever!

Lisa and Stephen didn’t have a baby shower.  They had a baby party!  Their baby party was about 60 guests, so I made 120 glitter puff cookies with personalized labels for each package.

Each guest received a cookie favor with 2 glitter puff cookies in a cute little package.

Around midnight on Friday (the day before the shower), I decided that I NEEDED to make Lisa and Stephen vegan cupcakes as well.  I had so much fun making the cookies that I just had to make 2 dozen chocolate vegan cupcakes with chocolate vegan buttercream.  You know.  For good measure.

[wasn't that punny of me?]

There were no vegans at the party, but I just felt inspired.  Since there were no vegans at the party, I decided it would be prudent to include a hand-piped chocolate heart (non-vegan) on each cupcake, and then finished the cupcakes with royal blue sanding sugar to match the cookie favors.

Here they are, displayed at the shower.

From what I hear, everyone loved my goodies, and I was so happy to provide these treats for Lisa and Stephen!

As I was standing in my kitchen at 2AM, with sore knees, an aching back, and dry eyeballs, piping chocolate buttercream onto cupcakes, I realized something very important.  When I do things that I love, even when I’m putting myself through agony, it just doesn’t feel like a chore.  Despite the fact that I had cookie batter, powdered sugar and buttercream strewn throughout my kitchen, I couldn’t stop smiling.  Then, as I rolled out of bed on Saturday morning after only 4 hours of sleep so that I could get everything finished, I was still smiling.

I am taking a huge risk in order to fulfill a lifelong dream.  It’s complicated, but it’s worth it.

Stay tuned.  Cupcake Thursdays will become a new installment at Joggers Life, while I develop new cupcake flavors and experiment for my Taste Crew!

I’ll admit that vegan cupcakes had me skeptical.

Cupcakes without eggs?

Pfffttt!  It’ll never work!

I was so wrong.

I love marble cake.  Marble cupcakes.  Marble fudge.  Chocolate/vanilla softserve (“twist” as we call it in good old CNY).  I’m not incredibly fond of chocolate, but if you put vanilla together with chocolate, I’m all over it.

This recipe was perfect for me.

In the recipe, it actually states that pouring the chocolate and vanilla simultaneously into the cupcake tin is tricky for the hand/eye UNcoordinated.  I thought I would have no problem.  I was again, sadly mistaken.  It was really difficult, but I managed.

They were a little messy, but it was ok.  After this, I swirled the batter around with a toothpick.  Next time, I’ll use a knife for an even more swirly affect.

The recipe recommended baking for 25-27 minutes in a 350 degree oven.  Since I was too lazy to take out my pizza stone, mine didn’t take as long, so they were finished in 20 minutes.  I didn’t take a picture of them straight out of the oven, but they were lovely.

But, here they are with a layer of fluffy vegan buttercream piped on.  I love how it looks like marshmallow!

Mmmmm.  Cupcakes.

Last week, I made my first recipe from the Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World cookbook (me and cupcakes have been getting along well lately), and as a result, I had about a cup of leftover vegan chocolate ganache.  Since I don’t let anything go to waste these days (thank you, Sarah), I put the leftover ganache to good use.

Oh, heavenly cupcakes.

So, I know you’re wondering if they dry, mushy, or fall-apart-y due to having no egg in the recipe.

Nope.

Definitely not.

I mean, I tried this one first just to make sure.

Then I had another so that I was absolutely sure that the first one wasn’t an anomoly.  They’re definitely all moist, delicious, and totally vegan.  And the buttercream.  I’m not even going to talk about the buttercream.  I would be here all day.

Vegan cupcakes might just take over the world.

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