It’s my party and I’ll cry eat delicious cupcakes if I want to!
Ok, it’s not technically my party, but it is my girlfriend’s birthday tomorrow and we’re have a girl’s get together for lunch. I was ever so politely asked (note: begged) to bring a dessert along and I have had cupcakes on my mind ever since!
It feels like forever since I have made cupcakes (which probably means 2 weeks in my world) and I knew I had to do something to remedy this situation.
Liz loves cupcakes. I love cupcakes. Other people love cupcakes. It’s a win-win-win. Beat that Team Sheen.
Cupcakes, to me, are a triple threat. They are one of my favourite desserts to bake (easy), decorate (fun + easy), and photograph. You really can’t screw up a photograph with a cupcake in it!
It’s impossible.
On second thought…sometimes cupcake photos can turn out like poo-poo…
I present the ever-horrifying chocolate turd cupcake.
In all my excitement, I didn’t realize that I had piped perfectly formed turds on my beloved cupcakes until after I uploaded the photos.
It was not a proud moment.
Eric and I could not stop giggling at them. Seriously. It was bad.
Shits ‘n giggles?
Luckily, I redeemed myself with these delicious Chocolate cupcakes topped with fluffy sweet clouds of frosting and a fruity raspberry glaze. They are a fun cupcake to bring to any Spring or Summer gathering because they are just so light and fluffy with a hint of fruit on top. Gathering or not, you should make them just because you are special. That should be reason enough!
I love cupcakes because the batter can be thrown together in just a few minutes. This recipe doesn’t get any easier too. It is literally- 1) Mix wet, 2) Sift in dry, 3) Mix. 4) Scoop.
Vegan Chocolate Cupcakes
Yield: 12 cupcakes
Adapted from the famous eggless chocolate cake recipe. <—awesome!!
Cupcake Ingredients:
- 1 cup non-dairy milk (I used Vanilla Almond milk)
- 1 cup sugar (I used natural cane sugar)
- 1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil (or other oil)
- 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
- 1 tbsp pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 tsp pure almond extract (optional, but awesome)
- 1.5 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
- 1/3 cup cocoa powder, sifted (I used Dutch-process)
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 3/4 tsp kosher salt, to taste
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350F and line a cupcake pan with cupcake liners. With an electric mixer, beat together the following ingredients in a large bowl (non-dairy milk, oil, sugar, apple cider vinegar, vanilla, almond extract). Beat on medium speed for a minute or two.
2. Now sift in the dry ingredients (flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt). Mix well, until the clumps are gone.
3. Spoon the batter into prepared cupcake pan, about two thirds full for each. Bake for about 22 minutes at 350F, or until the cupcake slowly springs back when pressed with a finger. Allow to completely cool before frosting.
4. LICK THE BOWL!
My Aunt got me hooked on this famous eggless chocolate cake recipe years and years ago! I adapted it only slightly. It always seems to turn out no matter how I make it!
These cupcakes are chocolaty, fluffy, and flavourful with a hint of almond and vanilla.
While the cupcakes are cooling, make the frosting. 
Fluffy Almond ‘Buttercream’ Frosting
Yield: ~2 cups
Ingredients:
- 1/2 cup Earth Balance buttery stick or equivalent, room temperature
- 3 cups icing sugar, sifted (I used organic)
- 1/2 tsp kosher salt
- 1 tsp pure almond extract (may sub. other extracts)
- 1.5-2 tbsp non-dairy milk, to achieve your desired consistency
Note: If making the frosting as shown in the pictures, please double the frosting recipe above.
Directions:
1. In a mixing bowl, beat 1/2 cup of Earth Balance (or equivalent) with an electric mixer. Add in the milk, extract, and salt. Mix. Now gradually add in the sifted icing sugar, starting with 1 cup and mixing slowly until fully combined. I like to use my stand mixer when making frosting because I leave it mixing for about 5-10 minutes until nice and fluffy. Alternatively you can beat the frosting with a handheld mixer, for at least 4-5 minutes. Reserve about 1/2 cup of the frosting if you want to make the raspberry glaze (shown below).
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I thought I would show you how I like to pipe my cupcakes!
My favourite decorating tip in the entire world is the very large Wilton 1A tip, as shown below. It eats small tips for breakfast. And you don’t need a coupler either!
1) To use, simply insert the tip into a pastry bag. Snip off the end of the bag so the tip fits through (as shown above).
2) Now place the pastry bag into a tall glass to hold it up and fold down the sides around the glass (image left).
3) Fill the bag with frosting and carefully twist the end of the bag tightly (image right). Secure the end with a rubber band, if desired.
Now you are ready to pipe delicious, fluffy mounds of frosting! Don’t be scared, it is easy! You can always do a couple practice trials too and don’t worry they don’t have to look perfect.
To pipe, start near the centre of the cupcake, squeezing the frosting out evenly working your way up the cupcake in circles. I like to make 3 tiers for an extravagant effect.
This is a great how-to video!
Fluffy clouds of heaven.
You can stop right there or you can top them with a glaze if you are feeling frisky like I was.
I saved a bit of the frosting (~1/2 cup) and I made a raspberry glaze. I mashed about 5-6 fresh raspberries with a fork and mixed it with the frosting. The raspberries release a bit of water and the frosting thins out into a lovely glaze that you can drip over the cupcakes. It added a lovely hint of raspberry to the cupcakes that paired well with the chocolate and almond flavours!
Of course, I was ‘forced’ to taste-test before giving them to Liz.
I slowly unwrapped the corners of the liner, revealing a chocolaty cupcake…
I slid the fork through each layer of fluffy frosting…
And I devoured every last crumb!
After devouring this cupcake in a blissed out trance, I deemed they were birthday quality, which is sort of a shame because I wanted to keep all of them. I am comforted knowing that tomorrow I will be able to enjoy another at lunch. ;)
Sweet Dreams.
Oh my gosh, nummmy!! These look delicious, and so pretty, too!
I’m thinking about adapting this into a layer cake for my brother’s birthday. I noticed the original recipe calls for 1 teaspoon of vinegar and yours calls for 1 Tablespoon. Was this a typo or did you find that it worked better with more vinegar?
Thanks! This is an incredible post, by the way! :)
nope that is not a typo :) enjoy!
This is my new favorite website!! I thought baking would be in the past trying to go vegan, boy was I wrong! I spend hours a day on your website (not kidding) I made these last week for my dad’s birthday and everyone love them. I didn’t tell them they were vegan until after because everyone gets weirded out and won’t try things if they know it’s vegan. My dad ate 2!
that’s great!
I made the original recipe for my brother’s birthday as planned, just doubling it for 2 layers, filling with raspberry preserves and topping with chocolate ganache–all vegan. My omni family loved it and it was so pretty! Thank you for the recipe inspiration. I’ve never made a vegan cake that turned out so well! :)
I made the chocolate cupcakes for my friend’s birthday yesterday along with another vegan vanilla cake. The chocolate was certainly the better of the two. How do you feel about creating a vanilla version of the chocolate cake? If anyone can do it, I know you can!
wow, they look so delicious! and the icing… can you send me one? thanks.
I am so excited to try this recipe! My son is egg-free, dairy-free, and has a texture aversion to bread like consistencies. The texture aversion is due to the fact that most bread like things have dairy and/or eggs so he doesn’t eat them very often. I am so excited to have found your blog (through a post on pinterest) and start trying your recipes! For the record, my son (who is 4 years old and tries to fit the word poop into every conversation because he knows it annoys me) saw the chocolate cupcakes, and when I asked him he said the frosting looked like ice cream! I told him you thought it looked like poop, and he laughed and said you were funny. I agree.
haha too funny! I hope you both enjoy the cupcakes!
I made these as mini cupcakes today, and my son stole 3 off the cooling rack before they were even frosted!!!!! Thank you so much for a great recipe, they were delicious! Now I’m off to find a vanilla cupcake…
My son has an egg and dairy allergy, and he loves chocolate, so these look nearly perfect! I’m thinking of making these for his second birthday party. Of course, I still have to contend with my husband’s gluten issues…do you think this would turn out alright with gluten free all purpose flour?
Hey Nichole, That is a great question and I’m afraid I don’t know the answer! I will have to try it someday. My only suggestion is to scan through the comments and see if anyone mentioned making them GF. I hope it works out for you!!
Mixing with one hand and typing with the other. just dipped my finger in the icing and it is delicious! thank you sooomuch for the recipe! I used coconut oil instead of the buttery sticks and still amazing!!
Hi there, I just want to say how lovely this recipe is! It’s one of the easiest, tastiest recipes for cupcakes I’ve tried. I made chocolate frosting instead of almond, and it was spectacular.
Thank you so much ^_^
Wow. These cupcakes are certainly the business. I realized that I actually knew how to make the batter from my childhood. We called it ‘Wacky Cake’ because it used vinegar. But I am SO GLAD I found it again! I’m always trying to entice people with yummy vegan treats, but no one ever believes how delicious they can be! Even my carnivorous brothers are begging me to makes these again. They were gone with 24 hours! My mother hates raspberries with chocolate, so I did 6 with the raspberry glaze, and then 6 with just dusted cocoa powder on top. She loved them! She even ate a raspberry one ;) Seriously, thank you so so much for sharing this amazing recipe!
The best Vegan Chocolate cupcakes I have EVER tried. I’m a professional pastry chef and this recipe is in close competition with my favorite non-vegan chocolate cake recipe! Sooo delicious!
I love these cupcakes! They are by far my favorite vegan cupcake recipe. However, I am wondering if I can somehow adapt this recipe to make red velvet vegan cupcakes? Would I just use the same ingredients for everything but add red food coloring?
Thanks for the help!!
These look awesome! I was wondering how they compare to the chocolate cupcakes from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World (if you’ve made those)? The ingredients are just slightly different, but these look like they rise better.
lol! i discovered the truth about the chocolate frosting and that tip too! fortunately it was a trial run. the neighbor kids, my taste testers, had some wonderful giggles over it. :)
Angela, excuse me but…what is that Earth Balance that you used? Is it like the butter but vegan? I am from Romania, and you can’t find that here, so I need to know what I could replace that with. Thanks a lot! :D They look impossibly amazing! :D
Hey Lumy, Any dairy-free butter replacer should work!
Deliciously moist cupcakes! I made a few changes ( being in Costa Rica I don’t always have the same ingredient options) I used Yuca flour. I also used a surprise cupcake pan which has a metal pin in the center of each cupcake tray to place a small chocolate bar or strawberry. Superb!! Thank you for all your amazing recipes that I am enjoying sharing with all my friends and family!
These look loveely.. Im gonna try this recipe for my eggless cake eating friends! :)
Thanks for sharing! I came across this recipe on BABBLE
Missy Spark,
THE GOOD REVIEW
Made these cupcakes several times now and I get RAVE reviews when I do! The chocolate is a look delicious and by far the best cupcake I have ever had. Everyone who takes a bite tries to figure out the secret to the frosting (almond extract). They know there is a little something making it special, but they are not sure what it is. Overall an outstanding recipe!! Thank you for another great one.
Hi Angela! I made these cupcakes last year for my daughter’s birthday, and will be making them again. They were a huge hit! This time, I’d like to make half chocolate and half vanilla. Have you tried a vanilla version of this recipe? How would the recipe change? Thanks so much!
Hey there, Yes I did try a vanilla batch and it turned out quite gummy. To be honest, I havent had any luck yet with a vegan vanilla cupcake recipe! So far they haven’t met my standards…