Thursday, September 23, 2010

Gluten Free, Egg Free, Dairy Free Vanilla Cupcakes

So I had a couple of hours to kill this afternoon and decided I wanted to make cupcakes or cookies or something of the sort. However, I really didn't want to spend any money or have to go to the store. I went to my cupboard and took a mental note of the ingredients I had. Many of you probably know that I am allergic to wheat, eggs, and milk. So, I went on a flipping spree through my baking books. I have some gluten free baking books but they all require all these really weird, expensive ingredients that I just don't have on hand. So, I went to one of my cupcake books to find a simple recipe. I found a decent, easy, fast recipe for vanilla cupcakes.

I substituted the flour with AP gluten free flour blend, the milk with almond milk, and the eggs with egg replacer (a powder you mix with water that acts in a similar way eggs will when baked). Everything else was the same (baking powder, sugar, etc). They turned out okay. The problem with gluten free AP flour is that it has this weird aftertaste to it. I prefer to bake with almond flour but of course, I didn't have any. :-) Gluten free also always tastes less sweet. I guess that can be good but it makes cupcakes and cakes taste more bread like than cake. But it was an experiment and for the first time, not so bad. Next time I think I will swap out a bit of the flour to add a bit of brown sugar.

The batter also didn't make very much. The recipe said it would make 16 cupcakes but they must have meant MINI cupcakes because I got a whole 6 cupcakes! haha! But since I am the only one around that will eat the GF, it is better there are less.


The icing (I say icing because it is more like poured fondant instead of a frosting/buttercream) was a wing it as well. Well, more of a wing it than the cupcakes. I really didn't start with much of a recipe. I took a bunch of powdered sugar and mixed with a little water at a time until I got a thinner icing. I then added vanilla extract. I decided to also add marshmallow to give it a bit of a different flavor. Ummm.....lets not discuss the fire I almost started with the first marshmallows I put in the microwave. heehee Let's just say I had to throw out the plastic container I was trying to melt them in. :-/  So, I finally got the marshmallows melted and mixed it in with the icing I had made. The thing about marshmallow is it hardens up really fast when it is by iteself. So, when you melt it to add to something, you have to add it quickly or it becomes a sticky mess. I was able to get it mixed in pretty good with the icing so I could dip the cupcakes.

Well, while I was waiting for the cupcakes to cool, the icing set up a bit too much. The first cupcake I dipped turned out okay but the second one broke. The whole top came off in the icing! In the end I ended up just spreading it on with a spatula knife. So, they aren't as pretty as I hoped. I sprinkled with some pink sanding sugar to make them look a bit better. But, they are a great sweet treat in the afternoon!

So, next time I will try a couple different things. I hope to have my own recipe in the end!

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