Peanut Butter Cupcakes Three Ways

Hey there.

Are you sick and tired of having only one way to enjoy your peanut butter cupcakes?

Are you tossing and turning night after night, wrestling with the idea of settling down with just one peanut butter cupcake topping?

Are you pretty sure peanut butter cupcakes know you're not a hit it and quit it type of person but sometimes your eyes wander and then your mouth wanders but it's okay baby, you're still the peanut butter cupcake for me but sometimes a grown adult just has these urges that are totally, totally normal and happen to everyone and if God wanted us to only enjoy one type of peanut butter cupcake for the rest of our lives, he wouldn't have given us taste buds?

Stop! You don't have to settle for another sleepless night!

Now you can live the good life with Mini Peanut Butter Cupcakes Three Ways!

Because you deserve it.  And cupcakenogomy is dead.

So that was weird, huh? I mean, all I've had for dinner tonight is cupcakes, 1/2 cup of edamame, and a yogurt and while that may seem like the perfect meal - it very much is the perfect meal and you were right for thinking that. My hands may be shaking? I can't imagine any correlation. Is this the danger of eating around? I should have used protection.

Let's get on with the deets...

Cupcake Ingredients

1/2 cup vanilla protein powder (use soy based protein powder to keep it vegan)

1/2 cup oat flour

1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 cup + 1 tbls crunchy peanut butter

18 packets Truvia

2/3 cup unsweetened applesauce

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk (or any variation)

Optional: a couple chocolate chips for plopping in the middle of the cupcakes before baking

Do as I say

Preheat the oven to 325. Line a mini cupcake pan with some mini liners. This recipe makes three and a half dozen mini cupcakes. Get ready to be overwhelmed. 

In a medium bowl, whisk the protein powder, oat flour, salt, and baking powder. Set aside.

Beat the peanut butter with the truvia with an electric mixer until well blended. Add the applesauce and beat it like Chris Brown just caught it with another cupcake. (Too soon? Too nonsensical?) Mix in the vanilla. Mix in some of the dry mixture followed by some of the milk and continue alternating, finishing with the dry ingredients. Mix until fully incorporated.

Fill your mini cupcakes about 2/3 of the way full (here's where you can add some chocolate chips in the middle if you want) and pop in the oven for 12 minutes. Take out, let cool, repeat a half a million times.

Now let's get on with the cupcake swinging...

Option 1: Peanut Butter and Jelly

Ingredients

4 tbls vegan butter

3/4 cup confectioners sugar (I didn't have enough - don't make my mistakes.)

A splash of unsweetened vanilla almond milk

2 tbls of your jam of choice...but always choose red fig jam. No pressure.

Get on with it

Using an electric mixture, beat the vegan butter on high for a bit. Then add the confectioners sugar and beat until it incorporates. Beat harder and faster (teehee) to fluff it up (teeeeeheeeee). Add the splash of milk and the jam. Beat beat beat beat until you're happy with it. Spread it on the cupcakes. Devour the cupcakes.

Option 2: The Jackson Pollock

Ingredients

1/4 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk (I had a lot of it, okay?)

2 tbls vegan butter

1/2 cup dark chocolate chips

Take the lazy way out

Get the butter and milk in a bowl together. Pop it in the microwave for a minute. Mix it. Add the chocolate chips and stir until smooth. Take your spoon and flick the ganache across the cupcake top like a masterful artist who's probably a little lot drunk hammered. Enjoy your delicate work of art.

Option 3: Chocolate Smothered Peanut Butter

Using the same ingredients as above

Dip your mini cupcakes top down into the bowl of ganache. Swirl a bit and set it on a cooling rack to set. Refrigerate to harden. Make sure to get chocolate all over your face and hands and face some more when you lose all self control and eat these like a savage animal. Yum!

So there you go. Three different options for your indecisive needs. And if you need more than three, you're just a sick fuck.

RATE ME!!

TASTE: 5/5 These cupcakes are so very good. Each option is a winner. And my love for bite-sized goodies is undeniable. If anything, the vegan substitutions in the batter elevate the taste and consistency. The cake itself is perfectly peanut buttery and the little crunches of peanuts are stupid good. Creamy peanut butter is for pussies and WonderBread. And you don't look like WonderBread to me...

EASE: 4/5 Vegan recipes are just oddly easy, if you ask me. Everything is so...soft. And when there's nothing in the batter that can cause you crippling stomach cramps if eaten in its raw form, it's also incredibly easy to taste as you go and adjust to your liking. And I like to pretend that it's healthier too. It's like taking a completely non-violent action to a bird with two stones! I think!

FILTH OF THE KITCHEN: 5/5 I'm just going to burn it down and start fresh. I think I have peanut butter and/or jam in my hair. I'll just shave my head. It's fine. I want to move on from this forever.

DID THE DOG EAT THE DOUGH? The dog woofed at me at one point because he realized it was 1am and I hadn't taken him out yet. Then I was all like, "Frank, shut the front door." And that confused him enough to convince him to go back to bed. (I'm pretty up to speed with my dog's mental capacity.) I think he's hibernating.

IMPRESS-O-METER: 4/5 If I've said it a million times, I will now say it a million and one times: vegan baking earns you street cred. Sure, it's a street that's gentrifying more and more with each passing second but it's also a street. And you cannot get cred anywhere else. Also, I hear they just opened up a new coffee house that serves one no-frills-back-to-basics brew in hand thrown mugs from a Polish grandmother's open-air studio that used to be a whorehouse. It's also fair-trade. It's pretty legit.

Mini Cupcake Nutrition Facts

per Peanut Butter Cupcake

32 calories / 3g carbs / 2g fat / 2g protein / 0g fiber / 1g sugar

per Peanut Butter and Jelly Mini Cupcake (estimation based on the recipe making enough for 20 or so servings)

72 calories / 8g carbs / 4g fat / 2g protein / 0g fiber / 6g sugar

per Chocolate Smother Peanut Butter Cupcake (estimation based on the recipe making a shit ton of ganache - I guessed 60 cupcake tops worth)

45 calories / 4g carbs / 3g fat / 2g protein / 0g fiber / 2g sugar

Post-Workout Cookie Sandwiches Revisited

I gave my I'm-Real-Beat-From-Running-Someone-Get-This-Girl-A-Cookie-Sandwich recipe a moderate facelift yesterday. It's the same basic idea, just a few ingredient replacement. So here goes it!

Ingredients

1/2 cup vanilla protein powder (use a soy-based powder for vegan)

1/3 cup oat flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

4oz fresh ground almond butter

18 packets Truvia

1/4 to 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce

1 tsp vanilla

2 tbls instant espresso powder

1 1/2 cups oats

1/2 cup mini dark chocolate chips

Do These Things Now

Whisk your protein powder, oat flour, baking soda, salt, and cocoa powder together in a bowl. Set aside. In a mixing bowl, "cream" the almond butter, applesauce and truvia til smooth. Add the tsp of vanilla and the espresso powder. Mix some more. Add the dry ingredient mixture a half a cup at a time. It should seem pretty dry. If it seems too dry, add a bit more applesauce. Add the vanilla and espresso powder. Smoooooth. Fold in the oats and the chocolate chips.

Divide the dough in half. Take one half and plop it down on some wax paper. Wrap it up like a tootsie roll and roll it out into a log. It should be about an inch and half or so in diameter. Wrap tightly in the wax paper and let cool in the fridge for 4-6 hours. Repeat with remaining half of dough.

4-6 hours/one reading of The Hunger Games later...

Preheat the oven to 350. Line some cookie sheets with parchment paper. Take your doughy logs out of the fridge. Slice the logs into thinnish cookie disks no bigger than a half an inch wide. If they crack a bit, you can always reform them with a little of the fallen off dough. Press the disks down onto the cookie sheets, making them just a tad slimmer and peanut butter spreading friendlier. Add fallen apart dough as needed. Bake for 9 minutes. Remove and cool for a minute or 2 on the sheets, then transfer to cooling racks.

Assembly!

This is pretty straightforward. If it isn't, I'm afraid of how you got this far and no, this is not a pie recipe. Take one cookie. Spread a tablespoon of your favorite chunky peanut butter on the smooth bottom side. Top with another cookie's smooth bottom side. Giggle about "smooth bottom sides."

Nutrition Facts

Per cookie 

50 calories / 6g carbs / 3g fat / 2g protein / 1g fiber / 0g sugar

(based off the recipe making the 42 cookies I made)

Per cookie sandwich with a tablespoon of Maranatha No Stir Crunchy Peanut Butter

190 calories / 16g carbs / 14g fat / 8g protein / 3g fiber / 3g sugar

Vegan Blueberry Muffins

Hey guyz! It’s me! Molly! And I made some muffins, yo. I’ve also started ending my sentences with yo, yo. Things have really changed since I last posted. (Yo.)

I'm so excited to not see you in person!

In my hiatus from baking and blogging, I’ve been fixated on a dazzling array of things. What’s that? You said you want to read about these things in list form? 

I THOUGHT YOU’D LIST FORM NEVER ASK.

• Those new Ford commercials? With the press conferences? With the new Ford owners? They claim to be real? The fuck? The fuck. IAMNOTSTUPIDFORD. America is not stupid, Ford. Why do you treat us like we are so stupid? Is it because we look stupid? You are such an asshole. Now let me buy a Ford or twelve.

• I’ve haven't baked anything since moving to my new apartment. This is especially silly because my oven is really shiny and, like 12 brand new Fords, shiny = high quality. Also, my apartment is tiny (456 sq ft tiny) and the smell of fresh baked goods would certainly fill the space much lovelier than the smell from my garbage disposal.

• Blueberries taste yum.

Blueberries are so expensive that they should print cash on blueberries
so cash would have more value and save our economy.
Yall can stop occupying Wall Street now. I fixed it. 

So this evening I did something about these things. I made some Vegan Blueberry Muffins. Why vegan blueberry muffins? For the same reason I've made other vegan things... Because lay off my case. That's why. Also milk makes me feel yucky. Please don't tell anyone. I have to maintain my strong facade. I wish I'd never italicized the word "vegan" earlier in this paragraph. 


Can we talk about this recipes "wet mixture" instead?

I almost wish this was animal insides.
So it'd be less disgusting looking.

It's like anything but an animal bled into that bowl. Amiright?


Here. Have some streusel.

Streusel doesn't make anyone feel yucky!
No one!

Have you met my friend Streusel? It's like that natural exfoliating face wash you keep in the shower that, whilst washing off your freshly exfoliated face, tempts you to "forget" to close your mouth and taste a lot little of? Yeah. Just like that but double the brown sugar and imitation butter.

Do you want a nest of sugar and oats topping your muffin
or should I get used to telling you what's good for you?

So longest-story-in-the-world-ever short, these muffins are delightful. Like your sister but not the one that sucks, the one you like. Will you be my sister?

I can't wait to destroy you.
De. Stroy.

If you'd like to find the recipe (A SISTER WOULD DO IT), it was unceremoniously stolen from Delicious Sweets. And made slightly sugary-er. JK. I threw a lot more sugar into it.

RATE ME!



TASTE: 3.75/5 Bitches be yummy, yo. (THINGS ARE SO DIFFERENT NOW.)

EASE: 5/5 The hardest part of this recipe was taking a large bowl out of the dishwasher when it was still relatively hot from the drying cycle. So basically, it was the toughest.

FILTH OF THE KITCHEN: -5/5 Ok, get a load of this shit. I actually cleaned my kitchen so I’d have room to make these muffins. Stop raising your eyebrows in disbelief. You’ll get wrinkles and you’ll be ugly and no one will love you.

DID THE DOG EAT THE DOUGH: You know, ordinarily I’m sure he would have but currently he's focusing all his energy towards being afraid of his dinner bowl. I - I don’t understand. It’s like he told me he smells toast and had a stroke.

IMPRESS-O-METER: 5/5 Every time I take a bite of these muffins, a songbird flies through my balcony door and thanks me personally for not harming any of his animal brethren in the making of these baked goods. To be honest, I’m afraid of birds and I want them out of my apartment. But they refuse to stop tipping their tiny bird hats at me and I don’t have a broom to chase them out. Apparently, this is my life now.


Also, I cannot WAIT for my surprise press conference. I am going to make ALL the jokes.

Vegan Chocolate Salty Peanut Butter Balls

Before you read any further, I'd like to tell you something really, really important. I've been lauding the delightfulness of my vegan chocolate salty peanut butter balls for literally tens of minutes. I don't know if you think (you probably don't, amateur) but tens of minutes is SO MANY minutes to express love for vegan chocolate salty peanut butter balls. Especially aloud. Espcially to your mother. Especially to your extremely judgmental kitchen cabinets.

When will I live up to your standards?!

Anyways, I know Chef was the original purveyor of chocolate salty balls and I know the addition of "peanut butter" to "chocolate salty balls" makes you immediately think "creamy venereal disease" (no? how about now? that's what I thought. yummzville.) but that's just absurd. Just about everything in the world can and will benefit from the addition of peanut butter.

Example: Shampoo? Work a dollop of PB into your locks, neither wash no rinse, and voila! your hair is a tasty snack for mid shower hunger pangs. (You're allowed to called them "hunger bangs" if you're really clever.)

Example: Feeling chilly? Nothing says "boy am I comfy cozy" like a thin (or thick) layer of PB under your clothes. It also says "I'm friends with both bees and people who walk around with celery stalks and raisins!" but who couldn't use more friends? Amiright?

Those examples were exhausting. Less exhausting? These vegan chocolate salty peanut butter balls. They took about 20 minutes or so to make, including bake time. I've had eybrow waxing appointments take longer than that. And these balls makes you cry less too! (This whole post is one giant that's-what-she-said joke. Sigh. Such is life.)

"Hey baby, I wonder if you can fit all of me in your mouth?" - Vegan Chocolate Salty Peanut Butter Ball 2011 Predator of the Year

Oh yeah. Here's some of the nitty gritty. This recipe came from my new vegan baking cookbook, The 100 Best Vegan Baking Recipes: Amazing Cookies, Cakes, Muffins, Pies, Brownies, and Breads by Kris Holecheck. Although completely void of pictures, it's a pretty lovely little cookbook. Although the snickerdoodle recipe is more like a snickerdoody recipe if you catch my drift. (It's like poop.)

I'd like one of those hot stone massages but with
Vegan Chocolate Salty Peanut Butter Balls.
Everywhere.

RATE ME!

TASTE: 5/5 - The salty balls can do no wrong.
EASE: 5/5 - My dog could make these cookies if he wasn't such a gluttonous tramp who had no sense of self control. But I'm also willing to say a life size cardboard cutout picture of my dog could also manage this recipe. If the cardboard Frank wanted it bad enough.
FILTH OF KITCHEN: 1/5 - My cleanup process was included in my 20ish minute questimate of total time spent in the kitchen. No egg mess (thanks vegans!), no melting chocolate (thanks society!), and my peanut butter wasn't even terribly sticky (thanks advances in Peter Pan peanut butter air whipping technology!). My goodness. This recipe is starting to look dangerously perfect.
DID THE DOG EAT THE DOUGH: The dog was too busy trying to eat the cat. That boy needs to get his priorities straight.
IMPRESS-O-METER: 3/5 - See, I have this dilemma. I want to make a balls joke here so bad. So so bad. What if you just lolz as you would lolz had I told a really great balls deep joke involving my vegan chocolate salty peanut butter balls right here without me having to make a balls deep joke? Because if I make an honest to goodness balls deep joke here, I'll have to explain the term "balls deep" to my mom. Or I want have to. Honestly, I'm not sure which would be worse.

Do you see what I did here?
It's a face!

Voyages to the Great Vegan Unknown

For you to feel just a bit like a jerk.

When I was in ninth grade, I got really into writing short stories. Really short stories. Like only-a-girl-with-ADHD*-would-think-a-short-story-is-500-words short stories. Well one story I remember really well was one about a dude. He kept hindering himself (as many times as one can keep doing anything in 500 words) in completely unnecessary ways just for the thrill of the challenge. The dude wore his pants backwards a la 1992 teen rap duo sensations Kris Kross just to making peeing a little tougher. In my short story, he failed out of school due to his extended bathroom breaks. Did you read that? He failed out of school. Because he wanted peeing to be harder.

The 90s weren't so much cool as they were revolutionary.
And cool. Mostly the cool part, actually.

So are you as excited as I am about that background story? I know, right! It was entirely too long! And relatively uninteresting to boot!

But here's the thing: vegan baking? Exactly like my Kris Kross embodying 9th grade imaginary male alter-ego. (We all have one.)

Common misconception about Vegan Banana Nut Chocolate Chip Bread:
This bread was the activist who freed the diseased monkey in the classic movie, Outbreak.
Wrong. That was Patrick Dempsey.

Thank goodness I made that bigger. And bold. And followed it with a picture of banana nut chocolate chip bread.
More? Fine. Whatever.

A FEW MORE WORDS ABOUT VEGAN BAKING...

Vegan baking is challenging and goofy and like wearing your jeans backwards just cuz (COMPASSION, yo) or going out and killing your own chicken with a bow and arrow instead of getting one at the supermarket. Ok it's nothing like that last one but my guy managed to accomplish a lot in 500 words. And he definitely did the chicken thing. But mostly, vegan baking is super fun, guyz. It helps that I know someone who will gladly test out my vegan goodies (everyone should have one). Because shockingly enough, no matter how delicious looking they may be, vegan anythings still have the ability to scare some folks off. Sad stuff.

"I'm not a vegan, I just fuck a lot without harming animals."
-Big Punisher's original lyrics before he got real real fat. And died.

Vegan baking is a lot like a puzzle. Consistencies can be a little hit or miss thanks to the absence of eggs but you know what? Absence makes the egg grow fonder. I mean, I don't want eggs. But I've started getting love letters written in yolk and now I lock my bedroom door at night is all.

"Go on. Smear me all over your face. Let's take this relationship to the next level."

Vegan baking is also super for dough eaters. Remember that time you almost stopped eating unbaked dough because you were all like, 'raw eggs are not good for me to eat!' but you kept eating anyways even though you felt a little bad for your insides? You don't have to feel bad for your insides when you eat vegan dough! It won't kill you! Slowly! Over an extended period of time!

Let's be real guys. Vegan baking is sort of great.

NEWZFLASH: if Mini Vegan Jelly Donuts had footies, they'd be the cat's pajamas.

So if you want to try to do some vegan baking (and you do because you're not some sort of a monster, right?) here are the 3 recipes I used the other day...

• Mini Jelly Donuts
• The Heart Healthiest Chocolate Chip Cookies in the World
• Chimp Cakes Recipe That I Turned into Banana Nut Chocolate Chip Bread

*Fun note: I do not have ADHD. I'm just a little stupid. Easy mistake.

The Great Oatmeal Raisin Cookie Showdown

Ok "The Great" might be a bit much. And "Showdown" is maybe a little unrealistic. It wasn't like I drew a line in the flour a la that scene in the movie Hook and told the cookies that they can either be delicious or delicious-er a la the movies in my head. That would be weird because cookies making choices and my mind movies and whatever. But it's a moot point. Because that's exactly how this showdown went...down?

In this corner of my flour dusted counter, weighing in at a modest 133 calories and making the world an animal friendlier place, one block of firm tofu at a time is The Vegan Oatmeal Raisin Cookie.

"I make my own clothes out of synthetic fabrics!"
-Vegan Oatmeal Cookie's Senior Quote

Because I think Vegan cookies are interesting (I wanted to say exotic like in the same way the elderly refer to everyone not white as "exotic" but it's too soon or something?), I'm going to share the recipe with you.

*many hyphens were harmed in the making of this book

I lifted this recipe from Tofu 1-2-3: 125 East-to-Prepare Cholesterol-Free Recipes because if you know anything about me, you know I have a tofu-centric cook book in my possession. Duh.

.Ingredients.
2 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
2 cups rolled oats
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup vegetable oil
3/4 cup maple syrup
1/3 cup rice milk
1/4 cup silken tofu
1 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 cup of raisins

1. Preheat oven to 350. Line cookies sheet with parchment paper.
2. Combine flour, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon in a large mixing bowl with a wire whisk. Add oats and sugar and stir more. In a food process, combine oil, maple syrup, rice milk, tofu, and vanilla and puree til smooth. Pour liquids into the dry stuff and stir. Add raisins. Chill.
3. Bake for 15 minutes. Transfer to rack. Profit.

How exotic!

Shit was crazy easy to make, by the way. And they came out insanely perfect. I added a little extra sprinkle of cinnamon because I like to jazz things up/I wanted my kitchen to smell better/I think adding things to recipes makes me seem mad knowledgeable. Taste wise - not too shabby. I was surprised with both the consistency and the fact that I didn't notice the missing butter and eggs. Way to go, Vegans. I still think yall are batshit crazy but you know, your cookies can be okay.

I expected vegan oatmeal raisin batter to look much more resentful.

But this wouldn't be a showdown if there wasn't some competition.

I know what you're thinking. You're thinking this is a done deal, yo. Other dude shouldn't even show up. You're also thinking I am the perfect height to be an arm rest for most full grown men. There you are correct. The former, however, is what I like to call "jumping to cookie conclusions before giving the animal product using cookies a chance." Yeah. I like to call it that.

So let me introduce the challenger...

Continuing with the overdone, cliche at best use of boxing terminology, weighing in at you-don't-want-to-know and sporting a mean chunky salt topping is The Salty Oatmeal Raisin Cookie.

"I rob animals of their goods on the regular!"
-Salted Oatmeal Raisin Cookie's Senior Quote

I first had a salted oatmeal raisin cookie when I was a carefree youth on the mean streets of NW Washington D.C. I had stopped off at Marvelous Market (thug life) after school with my mom to pick up my favorite Caprese Sandwich (hood shit, yo) and maybe a nice challah or some french bread with olive dip and a Perrier (I've run out of impressive street lingo) when a cookie by the register caught my eye. A monster salted oatmeal raisin beauty. It was probably one of the top 10 single things I've ever eaten. So I sought out to recreate it.

I settled up my debt at Williams-Sonoma the old-fashioned way,
with an IOU note for my firstborn son.

This recipe came from the Williams-Sonoma baking book I just purchased. It was a little different that other recipes I've come across as it asked you to melt the butter in a skillet first. Then you proceed by mixing in the remaining ingredients by hand. The not so obvious differences from the Vegan cookie included the use of nutmeg and brown sugar instead of white.

Common misconception: The Vegan substitute for butter is sand.

These smelled hands down 100x better than the Vegan cookies. Like, if you're into that sorta thing. To give them that little extra salty kick, I topped them with this fancy pants finishing salt I bought at Williams-Sonoma (I only spent a million dollars there is what I'm getting at). Popped those bitches in the oven and BOOM. Incredz.

Common misconception #2: Oatmeal Raisin Cookie batter
can replace your every daily need.

But to compare the two is pretty hard. The regular cookies flatted a bit more than I wanted while the Vegan ones kept a really lovely shape. They look just about perfect. The regular cookies are much more home-made in appearance. But man. The salt. I added extra salt to half of the Vegan cookies too and it just makes such an incredible difference. I highly suggest topping your oatmeal raisin cookies with chunky salt. Shit is unreeeeeeeeeal.


THE SHOWDOWN PART OF THE PROMISED SHOWDOWN!

TASTE: Salted Oatmeal Raisin Cookies. The vegan cookies are surprisingly good but the consistency is a little spongier than I'm used to. The salted cookies are really delicious. So salty. So wonderfully spiced.
EASE: Vegan Oatmeal Raisin Cookies. I've found that any cookie recipe that involves a food processor is way easier than any cookie recipe that does not. I don't really know how to justify this argument but it's my blog, not yours, and beat it.
FILTH OF KITCHEN: Vegan Oatmeal Raisin Cookies. It helped that they had like 9 more ingredients to deal with. And sloppy ingredients at that.
DID THE DOG EAT THE DOUGH: It's official. My dog does not like to hang out in this kitchen while I bake. It's a real drag because it means I have to mop the floor now.
IMPRESS-O-METER: It's almost a toss up here. On one hand, Vegan Cookies are pretentious and the Impress-O-Meter was birthed from pretension. But on the other hand, I topped those other guys with finishing salt. Finishing salt. What can I say, I'm 100% impressive 80-93% of the time.