Karina: "Now That's A Spicy Cupcake!"

A.) I love me some spice.
B.) I love me some chocolate.

Put the two together and you get insanely good cupcakes. Here are my vegan chocolate-chili cupcakes with vanilla-cayenne frosting. Boom.


I took:
2 cups water
3/4 cup olive oil
2 tbsp white vinegar
3 1/2 cups unbleached flour
2 cups organic unbleached sugar
1 tbls sea salt
2 tbls baking soda
3 tbls vanilla
1-2 tbls chili pepper powder
1/2 small diced green hot pepper
4 squares melted semi-sweet chocolate
3 tbls cocoa

I have to admit that these were approximately the ingredients I used (since I added and improvised along the way!) I started mixing the dry and the wet and then added them together until they were well mixed, smooth and delicious. I really wanted something with a lot or rich kick, so I started with less chili powder and fresh pepper and added more and more along the way. (Same with the amount of chocolate and sea salt.) Again, just follow your taste buds to the perfectly satisfying flavor. As long as you don't tamper too much with your flour, oil and baking soda amount while baking, you can add and change pretty much whatever ingredients you like! I divided the batter up in several cupcake pans and sent them to the 350* oven to transform into beautiful, spice-filled treats for 25-30 minutes.

For the frosting, I started with 1 cup powdered sugar and a few tbls of earth balance. I added a splash of vanilla hemp milk, a drizzle of agave, several shakes of cayenne pepper, a few of the chili-powder, and the scrapings of two vanilla beans. I blended with a hand mixer, adding more powdered sugar and earth balance until I had a thick, lovely texture with a whole lot of zing.

I also had the remaining hot peppers and decided to try to candy them to use as a garnish along with my pomegranate seeds I had found. I boiled them in a pot of sugar water (1 cup sugar - 1/2 cup water) for 10-15 minutes. I dried them out on a paper towel and drizzled honey and sugar over them. Even with the attempted sugar overcoat- DANG- these were spicy! I put them in top but warned people they might induce tears.


Hot Damn, Chocolate.