Eggless Dark Chocolate Cupcakes with Strawberry Frosting

Chocolate and strawberries are two of my very close friend's favourite and i thought this is the perfect timing to blend both ingredients together for i was invited over for lunch at her place and i thought a sweet dessert might be good. Since she doesnt consume eggs, its another good chance for me to try out another eggless cake with different ingredients used as compared to my previous Eggless Chocolate Muffins. I didnt wanna make the usual rectangular or round cake so i thought why not turn it into cupcakes! Easy to consume and cute looking at the same time!

At first i was skeptical on whether to frost the cupcakes or not then i thought why not give it a try and see if she likes it. We both not a big fan of frosting or whipped cream or anythin creamy for that matter so to have frosting on it its a 50-50 thing , where you either like it or hate it. For someone that doesnt like creamy stuff i actually like the taste of the frosting when i was done whipping it. Food definitely taste different when nothing but the best and fresh ingredients used.

Ingredients:

CUPCAKES
1 packet of eggless premix
400gm condensed milk
100ml full cream milk
200ml UHT milk
185gm melted butter
1 tsp chocolate paste/compound

Method:
1) Beat the sugar (came together with the eggless premix) with the condensed milk, full cream milk and UHT milk until sugar dissolved.
2) Add the melted butter and chocolate paste
3) Fold the premix
4) Scoop the batter into the lined muffin tray and bake in the preheated oven of 180 degrees C for 30mins or when the cake tester comes out clean.

Note:
If eggless premix is unavailable you can use the eggless cake/cupcakes recipe available in cookbooks or internet. If you're in a creative mood, feel free to experiment on the standard ingredients used for the eggless cake and add a touch of your creativity in it.

FROSTING

250gm butter
3 cups powdered sugar
1/4 tsp vanilla
1/4 tsp strawberry extract
3 tbsps fresh strawberry puree

Method:
1) Cream the butter until its light and fluffy before adding the sugar.
2) Once it has combined, add vanilla and strawberry extract.
3) Lastly, add the freshly crushed or pureed strawberry.

Note:
Crushed strawberries are good if you like to feel some texture in your frosting when you eat it. You can crush it with your fork.

But if you want a smooth and fluffy frosting then pureed strawberry is good. Put bout 4-5 strawberries in the food processor to produce about 3 tbsps of strawberry puree.

If your fresh strawberries are one the sour note, then sprinkle some soft brown sugar on it and set it aside until later use.

Mini Chocolate Stout Muffins

Its been a while since i heard or read blogs bout fusing alcohol with food items and i'm really intrigued by it. I've bookmarked a few but never really got down to try it out until this rainy afternoon. I got this recipe over Epicurious. As usual, instead of the whole tray of cake, i made it into mini muffin cups so that its easy to serve and also i dont haveta cut the whole tray of cake my way! :)

The recipe i followed yield 12 servings and by looking at the measurement, it sure was alot for my family so i halved the ingredients used. Since i adopted this recipe, i'll not repeat the ingredients and the methods here.

This particular recipe comes with an icing recipe but i omitted it since i wasn't in much mood for too sweet stuff. No doubt i love to look at beautiful decorated muffins/cupcakes but when it comes to eating all those frosting, i'm really thinking twice. I tried once a big "rose frosting" and i gotta say it was (frosting) too much for me, perhaps i'm gettin real old over here and i'm loosin the craving for sweet, soft and fluffy stuff.

For those that loves chocolate and stout at the same time, this is definitely the recipe to go for. It was really moist and the flavour was superb! I actually find that the mini muffins actually tasted better the next day! I suppose all the flavour settled down!

Eggless Chocolate Muffins

Having friend(s) that doesn't consume eggs/on vegetarian/vegan diet or egg allergy somewhat make you more alert bout the ingredients you infused into your cooking, especially if you're preparing for them.

I once experimented on an eggless dark chocolate cake but it was rather dry and with a different set of ingredients, needless to say i was rather dissapointed but i read that its not easy to bake without eggs for eggs give more flavour and help with the cake texture. So since its already written that it wouldn't be an easy task, therefore i brace myself for another eggless adventure.

So this time around instead of the usual muffins, i decided to experiment on eggless muffins so that i can work on perfecting it in small batches. The ingredients listed belows are just nice for 9 muffins in my 12' muffin tray.


INGREDIENTS
1 1/2 cups of cake flour
3 tbsps cocoa powder
1 cup sugar
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
5 tbsps corn oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbsp white vinegar
1 cup cold water

Method:
1) Preheat oven to 190 degrees C.
2) Line muffin cups in the muffin tray.
3) Sift the cake flour and cocoa powder together and add in sugar, baking soda and salt.
4) In another bowl, add corn oil, vanilla extract and cold water.
5) Add the wet ingredients to the dry and stir until combined.
6) Add the vinegar quickly and stir in - immediately pour into the lined muffin cups and put it in the oven and bake for 25-30.
7) Cool thoroughly and remove from the tray.

Note:
Instead of using all-purpose flour, i replaced it with cake flour and sprinkled some chocolate rice on top before placing it in the preheated oven.

I have no idea how a great delicious- tasting eggless muffins should taste like but i noticed there's a strong taste of baking soda. Perhaps i can experiment further and replace it with baking powder instead. i wonder if the effect would be the same. I've read somewhere that some even use coke in their eggless cake. That coke in cake sure sounds intriguing. I'm definitely tryin that out the next time around

Wickedly Peanut Butter

Sinfully Peanut buttery! That's all that came into my mind when i had my first bite. Its like falling in love all over again with peanut butter! Being an avid peanut butter fan i can't help but evilly indulge in it.

Peanut Butter Muffins

Ingredients:

* 2 cups all-purpose flour
* 1 tbsp baking powder
* 2 cups full cream evaporated milk
* 1/3 cup low fat milk
* 1/2 cup soft brown sugar
* 1/2 cup + 2 tbsps creamy peanut butter
* 1 tsp salt

Method:
1) Preheat oven to 204 degrees C.
2) Line the muffin tray with muffin cups.
3) Shift flour and baking powder in a bowl.
4) Place milk, eggs, sugar, peanut butter and salt in the blender and blend.
5) Pour the mixture over dry ingredients and fold until just combined.

Note:
I made some changes to the original recipe. The actual recipe only calls for 1 cup of milk but i substituted it with 2 cups of full cream evaporated milk and i added an extra 1/3 of low fat milk and 2 tbsps of peanut butter.

For those who love it to be on a sweeter note and more peanut buttery, feel free to add more creamy peanut butter and soft brown sugar. My version of peanut butter isnt too sweet, in fact i cut down on the sweetness so that the combination of the muffins and the frosting would be just nice and not too overly overwhelming.

Peanut Butter Frosting

Ingredients:

* 2 tbsps + 3/4 tsp milk or as needed
* 1 1/2 cups confectioner's sugar
* 1/4 cup + 2tbsps butter
* 3/4 creamy peanut butter

Method:
1) Place butter and peanut butter in a bowl and beat it with an electric mixer.
2) Gradually mix in sugar and when it thickens, add in milk a teaspoon at a time until the sugar is mixed and the icing is thick and spreadable.
3) Beat until its fluffy.

Note:
Don't add too much milk for the frosting would be too soft to make a nice frosting on cakes/cookies.

So there you have it, the muffins and the frosting! So what are you waiting for? Get your piping set out and start experimenting with it. This is my first time playing with my new toy and i gotta say i was really excited frosting my own muffins.

Come to think bout it, it looks more like cupcakes now! My frosting skills isnt that great and it didn't turn out very pretty there but i'm jolly happy with the outcome as a first timer on my piping set!

Coconutty Muffins

Baking with coconut was inspired by a friend. She being the coconut lover somehow kinda turned me into wanting to try experiment with the various aspect of coconut.

This is officially my 3rd time baking muffins and i gotta say im so totally into this baking thing right now. I even got myself a set of piping tools for the cake decorations!

I'm definitely glad that i'm venturin into a new territory right now where there's so much for me to learn and i've got the time to spare as well. 

I've replaced some of the ingredients stated in the original recipe, so here's the revised recipe.

INGREDIENTS: 

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup sugar
3 tsps baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 egg
2/3 cup coconut milk
1/3 cup corn oil
1/2 cup coconut cream
1/2 cup dessicated coconut

TOPPING:
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup fresh grated coconut
1/8 dessicated coconut
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

METHODS:

1) Combine the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in a large bowl
2) Combine egg, milk,oil and cream in another bowl; mix well.
3) Stir egg mixture into dry ingredients just until combined.
4) Stir in coconut once batter is well combined
5) Grease or line paper muffins cups in the muffin pan and fill it two-thirds full. 
6) Combine the topping ingredients; sprinkle over batter.  Top it up with more desiccated      coconut if you want to beautify it.
7) Bake at 204 degrees C for 20minutes or until cake tester comes out clean.

I was happy how the topping turns out to be; crispy, just nice sweetness with a hint of cinnamon! Unfortunately i cant say much bout the muffin, it wasnt as moist and light as i would wanted it to be. I did some research and i found out the culprit so what i'm gonna do during my next  baking session would definitely bear in mind the tips given on muffin makin and try to follow as closely as possible.

Blueberry Muffins

This is my second attempt in bakin muffins and boy am i glad i got it right this time! Though there are still a lot of space for improvement but im so glad i got the basic done, at least the muffins rose unlike the previous one where it sunk in the middle, causin the whole muffin too sweet to consume.

I think i figure out why my first attempt in bakin failed miserably. i was too experimentive (not sure if there's such word), i substituted corn oil with olive oil! look at how crazy i can get. you cant blame me though, i dont have any corn oil at home and i dont wanna be using the cookin oil - palm oil. Perhaps there were more factors that contributed to the failure than the substitution of oil!

I learnt my lesson and in today's baking session, i used corn oil instead of olive. Previously i used a muffin mix, as the same as today's blueberry muffin. I thought i should start of with a muffin mix first then only i start from scratch once im familiar with baking. I cant wait till i bake next. Its gonna be from the scratch the upcoming ones.

Today i baked a dozen of muffins and i suppose i can bake more with a muffin pan with the same amount of batter. Talkin bout muffin pan, i was tryin to talk my mom into allowin me to get a few muffin pans and besides with that i can save on the muffin bakin cases. 

So with this muffin mix, all i added was corn oil, milk, eggs and blueberry paste. And it took me bout 45 minutes at bout 175 C. There was no written instructions on the temperature and the duration of baking so i was constantly checkin the muffins with the cake tester i bought earlier.

For display and food photography wise, i should at least frost the cake but i'm not a big fan of frosting and besides i think frostin would be good on cupcakes and not muffins. Muffins are less sweet than cupcakes otherwise its similar