This is the second type of cupcake I made for the east bay vegan bake sale. Salted caramel is definitely a trend that I LOVE and often CRAVE! Though it sounds decadent, it’s actually fairly easy to make! Enjoy! 🙂
Servings: 12 cupcakes
Time from start to plate: 1.5 hours
Ingredients for chocolate cupcakes:
1.5 cups of flour
1 cup of sugar
1/4 cup of cocoa powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/3 cup of canola oil
1 tsp of vanilla extract
1 tsp balsamic vinegar
1 cup of water
Ingredients for the frosting:
1/2 cup of Earth Balance (or 1 stick)
1 cup of brown sugar
1/4 cup of mimic creme (or almond/cashew milk but mimic creme is best as it’s like a substitute for heavy cream)
1 tsp of vanilla extract
1/2 cup of vegetable shortening
3-4 cups of confectioner’s sugar
Sea or Kosher salt
This is how we do:
Start by making the cupcakes! Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F and line a cupcake pan with liners. In a bowl, add all of the dry ingredients and mix. Then add the rest of the ingredients (oil, vinegar, vanilla extract, water) and mix until there are no lumps and it’s smooth. Fill the cupcake liners about 2/3 to 3/4 of the way full and place them in the oven. Bake for about 20 to 25 minutes and stick a toothpick down the center to see if they’re ready (if you can cleanly pull out the toothpick, then they’re ready). If they’re not yet ready, check on them every 2 minutes because nothing makes a cupcake drier than being overbaked! Once they’re ready, let them cool before icing.
While your cupcakes are baking & cooling, you can prepare your frosting. In a pan over medium-high heat, melt your butter with the brown sugar and stir. Continue to keep it over the heat until it start to boil. Once it starts to boil, continue to stir & cook for about a minute, until the color turns into a darker caramel color. Remove from heat and add the creme and vanilla extract and stir until nicely mixed together. Set aside.
In a bowl, beat the Earth Balance & shortening with 2 cups of the confectioner’s sugar. Add about half of the caramel sauce into the Earth Balance/shortening/sugar mixture and use a hand mixer to blend until ice & creamy. You can either add more confectioner’s sugar or caramel depending on how you want your frosting.
Once your cupcakes have cooled, frost them with your caramel buttercream. Take the remaining caramel sauce & drizzle on top. Then add a few light sprinkles of sea salt (or kosher salt). ENJOY with a friend! 🙂
ifmarthawasvegan 