Vegan Mofo Day 13 - Chocolate Tease Cupcakes

This has been a recipe I have been toying around with for a while. My friend, Noble, is the creator of the original Chocolate Tease Banana Bread, which had milk, eggs, and gluten. She made a gluten free version that went over really well at a gluten free party we had. She sent me the recipe and I've been tinkering around with ingredients and ratios. I have 2 recipes from her original recipe - a loaf and a cupcake. I actually went around handing out samples to friends and family today throughout the day. It went over very well, and no one noticed the banana flavor, and there's only a slight hint of chocolate.


Chocolate Tease Cupcakes
1/4 c Olive Oil
2 ripe Bananas (the riper the better)
1/2 c Maple Syrup
3/4 c Water
1 scraped Vanilla Bean
1 tsp Cinnamon
3/4 c Brown Rice Flour
3/4 c White Rice Flour
3/4 c Teff Flour
3 Tb Tapioca Flour
1 tsp Baking Soda
1/2 tsp Salt
1 tsp Coconut Vinegar
1/3 c Enjoy Life Chocolate Chips

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Combine the olive oil, maple syrup, bananas, water, vanilla bean, and cinnamon in a blender and blend until smooth. Combine the dry ingredients in a bowl and whisk to mix together. Add the liquid ingredients and stir until combined. Add the chocolate chips and coconut vinegar after you have put the cupcake liners into the cupcake pans (or alternatively greased and floured the cupcake pan) and the oven is ready. Bake for about 20-25 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out nearly clean. Overcooking will cause them to dry.

Straight out of the oven, these cupcakes are amazing. They dry out a bit after 24 hours, so it's best to enjoy them the day of baking if possible.

I am still working on a suitable frosting combination. Perhaps the maple chocolate would be tasty...although I am toying with spicing up a version and going with a chai frosting.

Tonight I have big plans. I want to make an apple pie, bake my pumpkin and brainstorm on what I am going to use that for (perhaps combine with a little carrot and apple in a thick soup?), and cook up some quinoa flat-bread for "sandwiches" and Brussels sprouts for dinner. I also want to get to my new vegan cookbooks...

Buckwheat Crepes with Potato Mushroom Filling

What is Buckwheat?

When I first started realizing that I had a problem with gluten, I was pretty ignorant about how many ingredients were out there that I could still use. I didn't really know how to cook, so most of my foods came out of a package and were usually exclusively rice. Any time I saw buckwheat on a label, I put it aside assuming it was just another name for wheat and had gluten. As I got bored with the same old foods, I started doing more research and was happy to find out that buckwheat isn't remotely similar to wheat and most certainly does not have gluten. Wheat is in the grass/cereal family whereas buckwheat is in the Polygonaceae family or "smartweed" family and is referred to as a pseudocereal to emphasize that it is not related to wheat. The part of the plant used is not a grain; the groat is actually a fruit.

If you soak buckwheat, it will become slimy. This characteristic makes it useful in cooking because that actually helps as a binder. To me, buckwheat has a very distinctive flavor that I can only tolerate in moderation. My favorite way to enjoy buckwheat is sprouted and dehydrated. Raw sprouted buckwheat has a much milder flavor than buckwheat flour used in cooking. Baked or cooked buckwheat is something I usually pair with stronger flavors.


Buckwheat Crepes
makes about 10 7-8" crepes
1 1/2 c buckwheat flour
1/4 c sorghum flour
1/2 c potato starch
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1/3 c olive oil
2 1/2 c water
2 Tb agave

Combine the dry ingredients in a large bowl. Combine the wet ingredients in another bowl and quickly combine the wet and dry together.


Preheat a seasoned pan over medium heat. I run a little bit of coconut, grapeseed, or peanut oil on a paper towel over the cooking surface.


After the pan is heated, put 1/2 a teaspoon of coconut oil in the pan and swirl the pan to coat before ladling in the batter. I use a ladle large enough to put the right amount of batter in the pan at once. Then rotate the pan to spread the batter out thinly. For more tips on cooking crepes, click here.

One the batter bubbles and starts to firm up at the edges, work your spatula under the crepe and flip. Once the crepe is done, I transfer it to a cooling plate, and then to a stack of crepes with wax paper dividing them once cooled. These can be made the day before and refrigerate well.



Potato Mushroom Filling
Fills 5 crepes
2 red potatoes, diced
3 "cloves" shallots, chopped
3 cloves of garlic, minced
2 Tb fresh oregano, finely minced
1 1/2 Tb fresh chives, finely minced
1 1/2 cups chopped mushrooms
salt and pepper to taste
olive oil

Preheat the pan over medium heat. Add enough olive oil to coat the bottom of the pan. Once the oil is ready (will very slightly ripple because of the heat), add the garlic and shallots. Cook for one minute. Add potatoes and herbs. Do not stir often to let the potatoes crisp up a bit before turning them. If you stir before the potatoes crisp, you will end up with soggy, soft potatoes. Once the potatoes are nearly done cooking, add the mushrooms, salt, and pepper.

I cook these two components at the same time because the potatoes don't require much fuss.

Travelling with Allergies

Chicago lived up to its nickname while I was in town for business. The windy city was SUPER windy!

I have anxiety about traveling. I don't mind airplanes, and I can get a good night's sleep just about anywhere. I have trouble with food. Eating out is tricky because you have to find a restaurant that understands what contamination means. Even cutting something on the same surface or cooking something in a used pan can mean serious consequences for people with allergies.

Being vegan doesn't complicate matters for me. Animal products are usually marinated anyhow. I've found that vegan restaurants seem to have more concern for allergies and understand the impact foods can have. Locally, Chaco Canyon is great about letting me review ingredients, and other vegan/vegetarian options are usually just as vigilant. You can find decent options using happycow.net and I usually ask for referrals on sites like goneraw.com that have forums for vegans.

Surviving without Time for Restaurants

The meetings I was in included plans for the evening, so going out and exploring my food options really wasn't a reality. Planning ahead is crucial, and I was fortunate that a friend was willing to drive me to a grocery store when I arrived in town. I packed a few days worth of soups that were frozen solid. They traveled quite well. I also included date/nut bars, Gone Nuts packs (so yummy), raisins, quinoa (cooked) and pumpkin spice muffins (gf and home made of course). I went to the store and picked up some bananas as well as some seasonal fruit, carrots, avocados, shallots, fresh herbs, and romaine. I didn't have a lot of time for food prep between meetings and group meals, so I kept things simple.

vegan cream of mushroom soup traveled well
with freezing/thawing

Other things I packed:

• vegetable knife (Santoku)
• 3 hand towels
• food safe hydrogen peroxide
• rollable cutting surface
• medium bowl with lid
• large bowl
• fork and spoon
• vegetable peeler
• zip lock baggies
• dish soap

With those tools I could easily cut up fresh fruits and vegetables to take with me to meetings in baggies. I made salads with lemon herb dressing, guacamole with carrot slices as chips, and cut up fruit to go in my quinoa. As a rule I don't use microwaves, so I put a lot of warm water in the large bowl, and heated up my portions by immersing the food in the small, sealed bowl. This meant eating the bulk of my meals independently of the group (I have to admit I enjoyed the quiet time).

By day 4, I started craving more fresh foods and was ready to go home. I avoided a lot of anxiety by planning ahead (as well as discomfort and medication if I ate something inadvertently).

Lessons learned:

• Buy a wider variety of fresh foods
• Purchase a hand blender for dressings and smoothies

I am so happy to be back in Seattle! Annie was quite happy to see me and I have my Vitamix again! I didn't miss my stove so much as having access to fresh foods.

I bet Annie missed her smoothies!