Cupcakes with Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting

Kimberly and Cassidy wanted to bake something during the winter holiday so I suggested trying out the recipe "My Favorite Cupcake" from The Kind Diet. I loved the cupcakes; it reminded me of the light, springy, and not very sweet cakes from my childhood. However, Kaydn did not give a favorable review of the cupcakes. He was all excited when he saw the cupcakes with the pretty frosting, but after he took one huge bite he declared that it was the worst cupcakes he had ever tasted. "It is not sweet at all!" he said. A neighbor asked me about my blog one day and a couple of days later Kaydn told me that he feel sorry for his friend because his mom is going to cook some vegan food and it was all my fault. I had a great laugh about it; I seemed to always get into big trouble with the kids (mine and other people's kids) when I start to talk about healthy eating.

Since I "mess around" with recipes all the time, I can't help but increase the ww flour/flour ratio and replace the original frosting recipe with a chocolate cream cheese frosting that I derived form my favorite cream cheese frosting recipe.

Dry ingredients:
2/3 cup all purpose flour
2/3 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
pinch of salt

Wet ingredients:
2/3 cup hemp or soy milk
2 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
2/3 cup maple syrup or agave nectar
1/3 cup safflower oil
2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Frosting:
3 oz Tofutti milk free cream cheese
1/2 cup vegan butter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup agave nectar
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
          
Mix all dry ingredients together in a large bowl and set aside. Combine the milk and the apple cider vinegar together in a medium size bowl and set aside for at least 5 minutes, the mixture gets a bit lumpy.  Add the rest of the wet ingredients to the milk/vinegar mixture and stir to mix. Add wet ingredients to the dry mixture and mix well until there is no lumps. Pour the batter into lined muffin tin (the batter makes 12 cupcakes) and bake at 325 F for 18 - 20 minutes or until a inserted tooth pick comes out clean. Set on a wire rack to cool completely before frosting.

Frosting:
Whipped all ingredients together until fluffy.
This frosting is not very sweet; the original cream cheese frosting recipe called for 2 cups of powder sugar so the sugar has been drastically reduced. If a sweeter frosting is desired, increase the agave nectar to 2/3 cup or add some powder sugar. For a frosting that taste milk chocolate rather than the dark chocolate, increase the agave nectar to 2/3 cup, use 1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder and 1/3 cup non-fat milk powder or soy or coconut milk powder for non-dairy frosting.

Brownie with Chocolate Ganache Glaze

Since I become lactose intolerant and pretty much stop eating milk products, this dessert has become one of my favorites. It's quick and easy and not too sweat so I don't have to feel guilty about eating it. Roland can eat a whole pan by himself in one evening; I think he must believe that low in sugar + whole grain = no calorie. The original recipe is called "Coffee Fudge Brownies" from The Kind Diet. Since I don't like coffee flavor of anything, I modify the recipe to be just brownies and changed the glazing to a less fattening chocolate ganache glaze. I was going to call it "Healthy Brownies" but healthy and brownies just did not sound right together.

Dry ingredients:
3/4 cup whole wheat pastry flour
3/4 cup brown rice flour (I grind the rice flour in my wheat grinder but I am sure you can get them in the health food store)
1/2 cup unsweetened coco powder
3/4 cup date sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt

Wet ingredients:
3/4 cup rice milk or coconut milk beverage
3/4 cup maple syrup
1/2 cup safflower oil or other types of vegetable oil

Optional:
1/2 cup walnuts, toasted and chopped

Chocolate Ganache Glaze
1 1/2 cup grain sweetened chocolate chips
1/4 cup rice milk or coconut milk

Preheat the oven to 325 F and oil a 8x13 baking pan.
Mix all dry ingredients together in a large bowl and set aside. Mix wet ingredients and add to the dry ingredients. Stir and mix well and then add the walnuts if desired. Pour the batter into an 8x13 pan and bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until a a toothpick inserted in the center of the pan comes out clean. Place the pan on a wire rack to cool.

Melt the chocolate chips and the rice milk using a double boiler, stir continuously until the chocolate chips have melted the the sauce is smooth. Spread the ganache evenly over the brownies and let cool completely. If you don't have a double boiler, you can use a medium sauce pan and a large glass or stainless bowl. Bring one cup of water to a soft boil in the medium sauce pan. Place the chocolate chips and the rice milk in the glass bowl and set on top of the sauce pan to make the ganache.

My favorite alternative for the ganache during the Christmas holiday is to use the chocolate truffles dusted in coco powder from Costco instead of the chocolate chips ( about 24 truffles with 1/4 cup of coconut milk). Yum!!! My kids wanted to eat the truffles but I hid them deep in the freezer so I can use them on my brownies a little longer.

Cassidy's Sweet 16

Valentine's Treat

Kimberly and I wanted to make some treats for our friends for Valentine's day so we made these cute white and dark heart brownies from smitten kitchen /http://smittenkitchen.com/2011/02/white-and-dark-hearted-brownies/. It was really fun to cook with Kim; I never thought she would turn out to be so interested in domestic affairs; I mean the measuring, the mixing, and cutting duties. She was always interested in helping so she can sample her way through the cooking process. ; - )

It was not so easy to cut the brownies into the exact same size; we wonder if the smitten kitchen had rulers and squares rulers on hand to measure and cut. I also decided that we need a "thicker"heart shape cookie cutter; our cookie cutter is not quite as tall as the thickness of the brownies and it was a trick to cut all the way through and remove the cookie cutter from the middle of the brownies. However unevenly our brownie squares were, they turned out pretty cute. The kids love the brownies; I did not have any since I am not suppose to eat milk product or cane sugar. It was fun to give these Valentines away!

Chinese New Year

I love Chinese New Year celebrations; probably because it always bring me memory of great Chinese dishes of my mother. For the last few years, we got together with my friend Chris's family and cooked a lot of food and did a lot of chit-chatting for the Chinese New Years dinner. Last year a few of Kimberly's friends came to the dinner and this year she invited even more friends. In stead the usual 10-12 people we had about twenty. I put them to work as soon as they arrived to wrap the egg rolls and make pot stickers and it was a lot of fun.