Week Six: Vegan Vanilla and Vegan Chocolate Cupcakes

(Both of these recipes came from “Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World” by Isa Chandra Moskowitz.)

Things were going so well. I was getting a little cocky. I guess the time had to come.

This week, I experienced my first baking failure.

To preface this project, let me explain the dual purpose I hinted at before. I suggested that the bookstore where I work should have a cupcake decorating day, as a store in another city did this around Christmas. My store decided to do it as a Valentine’s project, so I and one of my managers each baked some cupcakes and then we went out and bought fun pink and red decorations.

I decided to bake vegan cupcakes, not only to fulfill my week’s project, but also to provide such cupcakes to any vegans who might show up (and to expose children to the idea). So I thought I would bake vanilla and chocolate for a little variety:

The chocolate ones turned out fantastic:

The vanilla ones, however, were a different story. The recipe gave me the option of using either margarine or canola oil. I had the canola oil on hand, so I went with it. The recipe instructed me to use 1/4 teaspoon of salt, but to increase it to 1/2 teaspoon if I was using the oil. The chocolate ones did not include these instructions.

Biting into those vanilla cupcakes was like biting into a salt lick…WHOA! I don’t know what happened, but 1/2 teaspoon was just way too much salt for 12 little cupcakes:

There was only one place for these salty dogs to go:

Anyway, the chocolate ones went over great. The kids (and adults) at work had a great time dumping conversation hearts and cinnamon bears all over their cupcakes. (Unfortunately, I couldn’t take any photos at work.)

So if anyone else has run into this problem, let me know. Or has everyone else just used margarine?

Tune in next week when I’ll be making Milk-Chocolate Cookies with Malted Cream!