hot for food

What to do with a whole bag of carrots? I tried to make Carrot Cake Muffins with a Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting. They’re not quite cake, not quite muffins. I think the cake/muffin recipe needs improving, but they were still tasty and not too sweet. I will be attempting this one again, but this picture is still worth a post, I think!

Here’s the carrot cake muffin recipe I used as a starting point. I made changes to it, but me thinks the problem is too much flour? Also to make them less muffin-like I would get rid of the oats. I also used mango instead of pineapple. The frosting is vegan and also easy. Combine 1/2 cup or 1 cup (depending on how much you want to make)  Tofutti Vegan Cream Cheese, beat with vegan powdered sugar, soy milk, a bit of lemon juice or extract, and vanilla extract. Just add more sugar or liquid depending on the consistency you want. I wanted the frosting to drip slowly around the top of the cakes.

I decided to try to bake something sweet and chocolatey using a mystery ingredient. You would never know what it is by look or even taste, but there’s avocados in them there chocolate coconut muffins! Now don’t go scrunching your nose. These are yummy, sweet, full of chocolate, entirely healthy, soy free, vegan, and full of fibre. I ate one right out of the oven and I was a little skeptical because I thought I hinted the after taste of avocado. But after letting them set into themselves, they were much better the next day, and the next, and the next!

Chocolate Coconut Avocado Muffins

Ingredients:
1 3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup raw cacao powder
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
6 tbsp ground flax seed
2/3 cup water
1/2 cup raw cane sugar
1/3 cup warmed coconut oil
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 mashed avocado
1/4 cup shredded unsweetened coconut
1/2 cup non-dairy chocolate chips
1/2 cup chopped walnuts (optional)

Combine dry ingredients and set aside. Mix flax seeds and water together and set aside. Combine coconut oil, sugar, vanilla and then add flax mixture and avocado combining everything together. Add dry ingredients and mix well. Fold in coconut and chocolate chips. Bake at 350 F for 25 minutes. Makes 12 regular sized muffins.

I think you could take this recipe and replace the avocado with soy yogurt, if soy free doesn’t matter, or a banana. Chocolate Coconut Banana does sound a little more appetizing! While this was a neat experiment for curiosity sake and the muffins were delicious, I think I’ll stick to tradition and use up ripe avocados for guacamole.

Did you get enough of those pretty pictures? Here’s the recipe for the basic chocolate cupcake, which could also be used to make a whole cake if you like. I did a little experimenting with replacing soy milk with water, and they turned out the same, but took twice as long to bake for some reason?

Chocolate Cupcake

Ingredients:
1 cup soy milk
1 tsp apple cider vinegar
3/4 cup raw cane sugar
1/3 cup coconut oil
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
1/3 cup unsweetened dutch process cocoa powder
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp sea salt

In a large bowl whisk apple cider vinegar and soy milk and set aside. In a separate bowl sift together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, sea salt. Add to the soy milk and vinegar mixture the sugar, vanilla extract, and coconut oil (make sure to melt it to liquid. You can also sub in canola or vegetable oil). Add half the dry ingredients to wet and beat together until smooth, add in the rest and combine well. There should be very little lumps in the mixture. Pour into muffin pan with liners, each about 3/4 full. Bake at 350 F for 20 minutes. Makes 12 cupcakes.

Raspberry Buttercream Frosting

Ingredients:
1 cup  Earth Balance
3-4 cups powdered sugar
1 cup frozen raspberries
1 tsp vanilla extract

Allow Earth Balance to soften to room temperature and raspberries to thaw. I just run and drain them under water. You want to push the raspberries through a sieve to get rid of the seeds and just use the juice/puree. Beat this with the Earth Balance and vanilla extract until fluffy. Add sifted powdered sugar until you get a stiff frosting. I estimated it was about 3 to 4 cups, but I just kept adding bits at a time until it was the right consistency. If you get it too stiff then just add a bit of water or soy milk and continue beating.

I topped my cupcakes with these colored vegan, gluten free sprinkles available at most health food stores. They just happened to be the right color match!

The vegan sugar cookies were good but not quite as soft as I had hoped they would be. I need to experiment with these, but here’s the recipe.

Ingredients:
3 cups flour
1 cup raw cane sugar
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup Earth Balance
3 tbsp soy milk
1 tsp vanilla or almond extract

Sift flour, baking powder, and salt together. Mix in Earth Balance with your hands until just combined, then add other ingredients. I continued to blend thoroughly with my hands. Divide the dough into two, flatten a little bit and wrap in plastic wrap. Chill in the fridge for about an hour.

Using a rolling pin, roll on dough on floured counter surface to about 1/4 inch thickness. Cut out and put on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for approx. 8 minutes at 400 F. Remove the cookies from the oven as soon as you see them turning color at the base. Let cool completely before frosting. I just made a simple royal icing and added pink food coloring.

I have my best friend’s baby shower today, and I am so excited! I also got to provide the treats for the party, which is even more exciting for someone like me. I think its official. I am going to open a bakery… what do you think!? All I need is a name, money, and time. Should be easy enough.

Anyway I wanted to show off the pretty pink treats with you. Btw, it’s a girl obvi, and these treats are vegan. More on that later. I’ll post the recipes with an update.

This week I had a cookie throwdown with a co-worker of mine. It wasn’t a competition, but more of an experiment. My friend LOVES ginger molasses cookies and the like, and she wanted to make this recipe in the Toronto Star. First of all, there is no picture from the paper. And I actually don’t make anything unless there’s a picture of what I’m striving for! But the idea was she would follow the recipe which has eggs, buttermilk, and butter, and I would make a vegan friendly version. If she preferred my version, then she would start baking more often without animal ingredients. Look at that, hotforfood is making changes in peoples lives! haha

Anyway I changed the recipe to have egg replacement powder (equivalent to 1 egg), soy milk whisked with lemon juice to create the buttermilk, and Earth Balance. And here they are. They turned out to be a chewy, moist, cake-ier type cookie. Sweet with a hint of spicy molasses. They have a nice shape and texture to them too, and are very airy.

Well the night of the throwdown, my partner in baking, texted me that her cookies were not good. Actually the direct quote is “they are mediocre pucks of bleh”. I thought, they can’t be that bad?! And I’m happy to say she was wrong. I liked them. And really who would refuse homemade cookies! But they were different. Crunchy, thin ginger snap type cookies.

They had more bite to them, were not as sweet, and had a smooth outer texture. Turns out she used whole wheat pastry flour, and fancy molasses. I need to research the difference between molasses. I used unsulphured molasses, and I thought maybe that’s why they weren’t as spicy. In conclusion, my friend preferred my cookies. I enjoyed both. And I recommend she makes my vegan ginger crinkle cookies since ultimately she just wants a cookie that tastes and looks like the big Ginger Cookies at Starbucks… but I assure my version beats the Bucks any day!

I seriously LOVE cake so much. Any kind, doesn’t matter. My last meal on earth would be a whole cake… all to myself. Anyway, I had so much fun making my first vegan birthday cake! It resulted in having extra cakes though, because I ended up trying different recipes. So I had even more fun using my extra cakes, concocting different icing and presentation ideas.

It was my bf’s birthday and all he wanted was a simple vanilla/white cake with chocolate icing. Looking online for vegan cake recipes I opted to try this one first at The Vegan Chef. I thought it turned out to be too heavy or dense. It has so much flour in it. And it was to puffy. Too much rise. I had to trim the tops to make them flatter, as I decided I was going to make a round 2 layered cake. It tasted good, but I was being extra picky. After some debate and anxiety I thought I should try a different recipe to get a lighter fluffier texture. I used a regular white cake recipe calling for butter, milk, and eggs, and just replaced those with Earth Balance, soy milk, and egg replacer powder. It was lighter, but it sunk in the middle. I don’t really know why it did that. And after searching online… no one else seems to know either. Some answers might be over beating the mixture, and get this, jumping around the oven? All very weird. But it still tasted good. I made an easy buttercream chocolate frosting by mixing powdered sugar, cocoa powder, earth balance, and soy milk.

See how lopsided it looks! The real fun and the following tasty photos were done using up the extra cake. What are these messy, stacked cakes like? Napoleons? I don’t know. There’s a fresh strawberry frosted one, and a peanut butter chocolate chip one. They were YUMMY!

Using fresh strawberry or raspberry puree is a good way to dye your icing (pink only) without using food coloring…plus it tastes better! I also had so much cake that I made some of these trifle-like cakes in wine glasses. They’re in the fridge waiting for a craving. I definitely have not found the perfect vegan vanilla cake recipe. There’s others out there. Some call for apple cider vinegar, which I guess reacts with the baking powder. I’m looking forward to more cake experiments in future!

Muffin tops are amazing! Don’t we all want them… not the kind above our tight jeans… but the crunchy, moist, crumbly top of a fresh baked muffin! I thought it would be hard to duplicate a bakery muffin at home. But it was not! I figured I would just over-stuff the muffin tin, and have the top of it sit and bake right around the edges. Well, it worked!

These are scrumptious and healthy (but watch out, there’s extra calories with that huge top!) Vegan Blackberry Cobbler Muffins. But this was like a “test kitchen” recipe because it only made 3 large muffins when I followed the same recipe from my carrot spice muffin post. I will work out a proper dozen recipe and let you know what it is. In the meantime, just drool at the photo.

Scones are scrumptious! But usually I stay away since they’re typically fat-filled with butter. A certain POPULAR coffee shop makes delectable pumpkin scones that are my downfall. But now I’ve made my own, even better, version! I found it posted on a veggie message board, with no original link, so I don’t think I need to credit the author. I added the maple glaze though to make them more reminiscent of that certain POPULAR coffee shop’s version.

Maple Glazed Pumpkin Scones

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp all-spice
1/4 cup earth balance
2 tbsp coconut oil
1 tsp fresh grated ginger
2 cups pumpkin puree

In a large mixing bowl combine flours, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, and spices. Cut in earth balance and coconut oil with a pastry blender or your hands. Then add in pumpkin puree and fresh ginger and combine well. Dump the dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead a bit forming a large circle about 1 – 2 inches thick. Cut into 12 triangles, like cutting a pizza and put onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake at 425 F for 13-14 minutes.

Once the scones are cooled off you can make the maple glaze by whisking 1 cup of icing sugar with maple extract, to your taste, and add in cold water a bit at a time until you get a glaze that is stiff but will run in a stream from the end of your whisk. Drizzle over scones.

As promised… my post about making my first vegan cheesecake.

It was a success! However, after sharing this with my bf and another couple of friends, we’ve decided it’s not so much a cheesecake – or CHEEZEcake – as it is a Chocolate Tart, or Chocolate Mousse Tart, maybe. Real cheesecake has such a distinct texture and bite, and when you make it with Tofutti/Silken Tofu etc. it loses that distinguishing factor. So after some thinking I’m going to call a Choco-holic Vegan Tart! The recipe I followed is from Dairy Free Cooking. But I ended up having to make some modifications because I didn’t buy enough Tofutti and couldn’t get all the way back to Kensington Market to buy more, so I subbed in 1 cup of silken tofu blended with chocolate soy milk for 1 cup of Tofutti. Perhaps this is what made it more like a mousse as opposed to a cheesecake?! But for a vegan dessert, this thing is satisfying, rich, and oh so chocolatey!

Choco-holic Vegan Tart

For Crust:
3/4 cup finely ground almonds
1/4 cup cocoa powder
3/4 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
1/4 cup coconut oil (or canola)
1/3 cup maple syrup

For Filling:
2 1/2 tbsp ground flax seed
1/3 cup water
2/3 cup dairy free chocolate chips
1 tbsp Earth Balance
4 cups Tofutti “cream cheese”
1 cup brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla

Grease your pan with non-stick cooking spray. I used a quiche pan instead of a spring form pan, but it worked well. You could also use 4 small tart/quiche pans. For the crust combine all ingredients in bowl and press evenly into your baking pan. Poke the crust with a fork all over to prevent it from bubbling up. Bake at 375 F for 7 minutes. Allow to cool while you prepare the filling.

Reset your oven to 400 F. In a bowl combine/beat the Tofutti with sugar and vanilla. Melt the chocolate chips with the Earth Balance either in the microwave  or in a double boiler on the stove. Mix flax seed and water (or egg replacer powder) in a third bowl. Add the flax mixture and chocolate mixture to the “cheese” mixture and combine well. Pour this mixture into your baked crust and bake for 5 minutes. Then turn down the oven to 275 F and bake for 40 min. (Leave oven door open for a few minutes while the temp comes down to 275 F). Allow the cake to cool and chill in the fridge for at least 2 hours before serving.

Additionally, I decorated the top of the chocolate tart with a mixture of melted dark chocolate and raspberry jam, and topped with fresh raspberries before serving. The crust is especially fantastic, and it could be used for any tart filling. I have to start brainstorming future uses for it. Happy Valentine’s Day!

Today’s V-Day Breakfast Menu was Green Frittata and Carrot Spice Muffins. I also had a coffee, which I’ve started to add cinnamon into everyday. I heard somewhere there are lots of good benefits to having a tbsp of cinnamon a day. It’s incredible in coffee so it’s now my new thing. I failed at sticking to vegan. The muffins are and obvi the frittata is not. But it was delicious, and I don’t care!

I discovered an unbelievably healthy carrot muffin recipe on Fat Free Vegan. Susan V’s recipes are amazing, mostly all fat-free, using whole, natural, unrefined ingredients, and the photos are to die for! I will add this site to my blog roll to share it with you. hot for food can only dream of being this good! Hey… I’m trying! Her recipe for the muffins is here, but I did a few things differently.

Ingredients:
1 3/4 cup spelt flour
1/4 cup raw sugar
1 tbsp ground flax seed
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp all spice
1/2 tsp salt

1/3 cup agave nectar
1/2 cup almond milk
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 cup shredded carrot
1 shredded apple
1/2 cup chopped toasted walnuts

Combine the first 9 ingredients (dry) together in a large bowl. Combine the second group of 6 wet ingredients together in another bowl. Add wet to the dry and combine until just mixed. Spray a muffin pan with non-stick spray or use liners, and spoon batter into the cups just to the top. Bake for 15 min at 400F. Makes 12 muffins.

This is the first time I’ve made a frittata. I didn’t really know what made it different from an omlette, but turns out it’s an Italian omlette! You could do this with any ingredients obviously, but this is a good for you, green version!

Ingredients:
6 eggs
1/4 cup soy milk
1/2 cup chopped asparagus
1 cup baby spinach
1/2 avocado, chopped
2 chopped green onions
fresh basil & thyme
S&P
1 tbsp olive oil
shredded cheddar or feta cheese

Pre-heat oven to broil. I blanched the asparagus in advance, so I ended up combining all the above into a bowl and then putting it into a hot iron skillet coated with olive oil. But you could cook the asparagus with the other veggies, onion, and herbs in the pan, then whisk eggs with milk, adding salt and pepper, then pouring that into the pan with the lightly cooked veggies. Once everything is in the skillet, sprinkle the top with cheese and just leave it to cook for 6-7 minutes, without touching it. Then transfer the skillet to the oven and broil it for 1-2 minutes. You’ll be able to see when it’s done.