Category Archives: Desserts

Desserts

Ginger Cupcakes, GF/DF/EF

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It really wasn’t until college that I started venturing into some ethnic cuisines.  One of the first ‘exotic’ recipes I tried was a thai noodle dish, and it was through this recipe that I found what would soon become one of my favorite flavors: ginger.  

I love ginger in Thai dishes, but I also enjoy it in desserts.  Specifically, I wanted to find a ginger cupcake recipe, but the majority of recipes out there, however, were nothing but glorified spice cakes.  I wanted real ginger flavor.   To get that, I utilized freshly grated ginger (two whole tablespoons), as well as ginger ale.  

Gluten-free Ginger Cupcakes
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Cupcake
  1. ½ c brown rice flour
  2. 1 cup sorghum flour
  3. 2/3 cup potato starch
  4. ½ cup tapioca starch
  5. 1-1/4 t xanthum gum
  6. 2-1/2 t baking powder
  7. ½ teaspoon salt
  8. 1-2/3 cup sugar
  9. ½ cup non-hydrogenated vegan margarine
  10. 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  11. 3 teaspoons powdered egg replacer
  12. ¾ cup So Delicious coconut milk, unsweetened
  13. ¾ cup Ginger Ale
  14. 2 Tablespoons grated fresh ginger (peel ginger and grate on a microplane)
Frosting
  1. 3/4 cup ginger ale
  2. 1 cup Non-hydrogenated shortening
  3. 1 cup non-hydrogenated vegan margarine
  4. 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  5. 4 cups powdered sugar
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 350. Place cupcake liners in muffin tin.
  2. In medium bowl, whisk together flours, starches, xanthum gum, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
  3. Whisk coconut milk, egg replacer, vanilla and grated ginger together. Add ginger ale. Set aside. Cream butter and sugar together in large bowl. Add half of dry ingredients, mix to combine. Add half of milk/ginger mixture, mix to combine. Repeat with remaining dry and wet ingredients.
  4. Fill cupcake tins ¾ full. Bake in preheated oven for 17-20 minutes.
Frosting
  1. In a small pan, pour ginger ale. Cook over medium heat until reduced to 1/4 cup. In large bowl, beat shortening and margarine together. Slowly add powdered sugar and mix until combined.
One Fine Tomato http://onefinetomato.com/
Something optional would be the candied pecans as seen in the picture.  It’s a simple recipe

Candied Pecans
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Cook Time
10 min
Cook Time
10 min
Ingredients
  1. 1 cup pecans
  2. 1/3 cup sugar
  3. 2 tablespoons water
  4. 1 teaspoon vanilla
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 325. Line a sheet pan with parchment or a silicon mat. In a bowl, mix sugar, vanilla, salt, and water. Stir in pecans. Spread evenly over pan. Cook for 10 minutes. Stir seeds. Cook another 10-15 minutes, until nuts are roasted and sugar is caramelized.
One Fine Tomato http://onefinetomato.com/
Desserts

Pumpkin Cupcakes with Penuche Frosting, GF/DF/EF

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I was going through my grandma’s old recipes the other day, and it brought back quite a few memories.   I remember the many holidays spent at her house as well as the time spent making brownies at cousin sleepovers at her house.  I also remember stopping by her house after school while on the way to piano lessons, and she would have a new dessert every time.   It was awesome.

She had quite a few recipes in her arsenal, but she also enjoyed trying new things.  She was an avid recipe clipper, and one of the funniest (and weirdest) recipes I came across in her recipe box was for an earthworm cake.

And I’m not talking gummi worms people (don’t worry, that’s one recipe you won’t see here).

This recipe for penuche frosting doesn’t really fall into either category.  It wasn’t one that I remember her making, and it wasn’t a clipping, but I really wanted to try it.  

Penuche FrostingI had never tried the penuche frosting before.  I’ve always been intrigued by in, in part because I was never sure how to pronounce it.  I’ve had penuche fudge before.  One bite and I got a sugar headache.  

Nevertheless, I wanted to try this frosting recipe of my grandma’s (and make it dairy-free of course).  It turned out perfect.  It still was pretty sweet, but also offered a more complex flavor than typical frostings.  Now I needed a cupcake to go with it.

Pumpkin or spice cake seemed like the logical choice.  The molasses that is a component of the brown sugar in the frosting would work perfectly with the flavor.  The thing with pumpkin cake is that they often seem to taste like a can.  This is remedied by cooking the pumpkin puree and spices for a few minutes.

Pumpkin Cupcakes with Penuche Frosting and Candied Pumpkin Seeds
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Prep Time
10 min
Cook Time
20 min
Prep Time
10 min
Cook Time
20 min
Cupcake
  1. 1/3 cup brown rice flour
  2. 1 cup sorghum flour
  3. ½ cup potato starch
  4. ¼ cup tapioca starch
  5. 1-1/4 teaspoons xanthum gum
  6. 2 teaspoons baking powder
  7. ½ teaspoon baking soda
  8. 1 can pumpkin puree
  9. 1-1/2 teaspoon cinnamon (freshly ground if possible)
  10. ¼ teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
  11. ¼ teaspoon powdered ginger
  12. 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
  13. 1/2 teaspoon salt
  14. ½ cup sugar
  15. ½ cup brown sugar
  16. 2/3 cup So Delicious coconut milk, unsweetened, mixed with 2 teaspoon lemon juice
  17. ¼ cup water
  18. 1/2 cup coconut oil, melted
  19. 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Penuche Frosting
  1. 1/2 cup coconut oil
  2. 1 cup packed dark brown sugar
  3. 1/4 cup So Delicious coconut milk, unsweetened
  4. 1 teaspoon vanilla
  5. 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
  6. 2 cups powdered sugar
Candied Pumpkin Seeds
  1. 1 cup hulled pumpkin seeds
  2. 1/3 cup sugar
  3. 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  4. 1/8 teaspoon salt
  5. 2 tablespoons water
  6. 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
Cupcakes
  1. Preheat oven to 350. Spray muffin tin. In a medium bowl, whisk together brown rice flour, sorghum flour, potato starch, tapioca starch, anthem gum, baking powder, and baking soda. Set aside.
  2. In a medium saucepan, mix together pumpkin, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, cloves, and salt. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, for 5-7 minutes until very fragrant, and darker. Mixture should be slightly reduced.
  3. Remove from heat and mix in brown sugar, white sugar, coconut milk (mixed with lemon juice), water, coconut oil, and vanilla extract. Whisk this into dry ingredients until combined. Fill muffin tins 3/4 of the way full with batter. Cook in preheated oven for 18-20 minutes or until toothpick inserted into center comes out with a few moist crumbs (these cupcakes are very moist so there will be moist crumbs are okay).
Frosting
  1. In saucepan, melt coconut oil over medium heat. Add brown sugar and cinnamon. Boil for 2 minutes, stirring constantly. Carefully add milk (it will boil pretty vigorously). Remove from heat let cool until lukewarm. Using an electric mixer, beat in vanilla extract and powdered sugar. As the frosting cools from the mixing and air is incorporated, it will lighten in color (I've sped up the process before by putting pot over a bowl of ice).
Pumpkin Seeds
  1. Preheat oven to 325. Line a sheet pan with parchment or a silicon mat. In a bowl, mix sugar, vanilla, salt, and water. Stir in pumpkin seeds. Spread evenly over pan. Cook for 10 minutes. Stir seeds. Cook another 5-10 minutes, until seeds are browned.
Putting it together
  1. Frost cupcakes with a small amount of frosting (it is a sweet and flavorful frosting so you really don't want to put frosting on more than 1/4" thick). Top with candied pumpkin seeds.
One Fine Tomato http://onefinetomato.com/
The pumpkin seeds are purely optional, but I love to have a little crunch with these cupcakes.  And, hey, pumpkin seeds are high in omega-3 so it makes the cupcake healthy. Right?

Desserts

Lemon-Blueberry Cobbler, GF

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I love the combination of blueberries and lemon.  They are a match made in heaven.  Cobbler is one of my favorite desserts.  So it seems logical to combine it all in one dish.  

The nice part about cobbler is since it has fruit in it, it’s healthy, right?  For my family, cobbler has always been more cake-like unlike what is found in the south, which is ironic since my grandpa was from the south. 

Blueberry Cobbler
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Ingredients
  1. 1/3 cup granulated sugar
  2. 2 teaspoons lemon zest
  3. 4 cups frozen blueberries, thawed
  4. 1/4 cup coconut oil, and 1/2 cup melted and cooled slightly
  5. 1/3 cup brown rice flour
  6. 1/3 cup sorghum flour
  7. 1/4 cup potato starch
  8. 3 tablespoons tapioca starch
  9. 1/2 teaspoon xanthan gum
  10. 2 teaspoons baking powder
  11. 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
  12. 1-1/4 cup sugar
  13. 1-1/2 cup So Delicious Unsweetened Coconut Milk
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 350. In bowl of food processor, place 1/3 cup sugar and lemon zest, and pulse 5 times. With a potato masher, mash two tablespoons of lemon sugar with the blueberries in a bowl until berries are coarsely mashed. Heat 1/4 cup coconut oil in a 13" by 9" baking dish in the preheating oven until melted.
  2. In medium bowl, whisk flours, starches, xanthum gum, baking powder, salt, and sugar together. In a larger bowl, whisk in coconut milk, and 8 tablespoons of melted coconut milk. Whisk in dry ingredients until smooth; it should be the consistency of slightly thick pancake mix.
  3. Pour half of the batter into the baking dish with the oil. Spoon blueberry mixture over the batter. Top with remaining batter. Sprinkle remaining lemon sugar over the cobbler. Bake 45-55 minutes, until golden, and berries are bubbling. Let cool slightly before serving. Serve with coconut whipped cream or dairy-free ice cream.
Adapted from Cook's Country
Adapted from Cook's Country
One Fine Tomato http://onefinetomato.com/