Linzer cupcakes

November 26, 2011

Since I was lucky to see lots of friends on Saturday, I baked lots of cupcakes! This second recipe is a slightly more faithful rendition of a Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World recipe: the Linzer cupcake is a recommended adaptation on the hazelnut cupcakes.

They're a little bit fancy without requiring cut-outs or piping or even buttercream. Well, technically the raspberry jam is supposed to be piped into the centre of the hazelnut cake, but I found that slathering a bit on top was much easier, and the dark chocolate ganache glided across the top of the jam just fine. A few extra chopped hazelnuts sprinkled over them add a bit of crunch and hide any bumps.

These were a lovely break from the chocolatechocolateCHOCOLATE rut I can get into with desserts. Admittedly the cupcakes do involve ganache, but it's the moist hazelnut cake and sweet raspberry jam that are the real charmers here.


Linzer cupcakes
(adapted slightly from a recipe in
Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World
by Isa Chandra Moskovitz & Terry Hope Romero)

cake
2/3 cup almond milk
1 tablespoon ground flaxseeds
1 cup plain flour
1/2 cup ground hazelnuts
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup sunflower oil
1/4 cup maple syrup
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
1 tablespoon Frangelico

toppings
1/2 cup raspberry jam
4 tablespoons almond milk
75g dark chocolate
3 tablespoons maple syrup
1/2 cup roughly chopped hazelnuts

Preheat an oven to 180 C and line a muffin pan with cupcake papers.

In a small-medium bowl, whisk together the milk and flaxseeds. In a medium-large bowl, stir together the flour, ground hazelnuts, baking powder and soda, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt.

Return to the smaller bowl and whisk in the oil, maple syrup, sugar, vanilla and Frangelico. Gradually pour these wet ingredients into the bowl of flour, stirring as you go and continuing until mostly smooth.

Pour the batter into the cupcake papers, about two-thirds full, and bake for about 20 minutes, until they pass the skewer test.

You can top them with jam while they're still warm! Use a teaspoon and make sure the jam is a bit stirred up and loose, not set like jelly. Spread about 2 teaspoons of jam on top of each cupcake, smoothing it as best you can with the back of a spoon.

Set the cupcakes aside to cool as you make the ganache. Bring the milk to the boil in a small-medium saucepan and then take it off the heat. Stir in the chocolate and maple syrup immediately, until the chocolate is completely melted and the mixture is smooth.

Spoon the ganache onto each cupcake, using the back of a spoon to spread it out. Sprinkle hazelnuts over the cupcakes while the ganache is still warm.