Vegan Raspberry Lemon Cupcakes With Raspberry Jam Glaze

One of our best friends was in town for the weekend to celebrate her birthday. I asked her what kind of cake she would would most like and she said "I love lemon and raspberry anything".

Lemon and raspberry are flavours I often do not bake with so I went searching for a cupcake recipe. I like the way this one turned out but I wish it would have had a stronger lemon kick. P and I are also trying to get away from using refined sugar which always leaves me stumped for good non-chocolate icing ideas. This time I thought why not use raspberry jam as a glaze. I think the glaze was my favourite part about these cupcakes it was so yummy.

Raspberry Lemon Cupcakes - Yields 18 cupcakes

½ cup vegan margarine, softened
1 cup sugar
½ teaspoon vanilla
⅔ cup soy milk
3 tablespoons lemon juice
Zest from 2 lemons
1¾ cups flour
1½ teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon salt
¾ cup diced raspberries, fresh or frozen

Preheat oven to 350°F and grease or line a cupcake tin.

Beat together the margarine and sugar until light and fluffy, then add vanilla, soy milk, lemon juice, and zest.


In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

Combine flour mixtures with wet ingredients just until mixed. Do not overmix. Gently fold in diced raspberries.

Fill cupcakes about ⅔ full with batter and bake immediately for 16–18 minutes or until done.

Raspberry Glaze

1 cup raspberry jam (I used a no sugar added type)
2 Tbsp lemon juice

In a small pot heat jam and lemon juice until it is liquid. Set aside to cool slightly. When cupcakes are baked and cooled spread glaze over each cupcake. The glaze will cool and stiffen. Serve cupcakes with a little lemon zest as garnish.

Vegan Falafel

For my November Secret Recipe Club I was assigned the blog Pepper & Sherry. Juls' blog is full of these awesome Polaroid-like photo's of all her food. And each recipe is laid out so nicely making sure you know not only what ingredients you need but also what equipment you will use as well.

If you are a meat lover than Juls' blog is for you. Although there were lots of yummy vegetarian dishes to try as well. I decided on this falafel recipe because I had never made it before and it sounded really comforting. I followed the recipe pretty much to a t except that I made the mixture in a blender and not a food processor so I had to add some water to facilitate the blending process. My mixture was probably a bit softer than Juls so instead of shaping the fafafel into patties I just scooped it straight out of the bowl with an ice cream scoop then flattened them in the pan.

 If you have never made home made falafel I hight recommend it. Absolutely delicious. I served mine with some crisped up pita, baba ganoush, tabbouleh, and a tomato & artichoke salad.

Falafel
14 oz can of chickpeas, drained
3 smashed garlic cloves
1 roughly chopped red onion
3 tablespoons gram or plain flour (gram flour is a gluten free chickpea flour)
tablespoon parsley
1 teaspoon hot chilli flakes
1 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon thyme
1 teaspoon coriander
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1 1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup water (If using a blender)

METHOD:

1. Put all the ingredients in a food processor (or blender) and process to your desired consistency.
2. Heat up about 2 tablespoons of oil in your frying pan. 
3. When the pan is hot, scoop out small patties using an ice cream scoop. Place into pan and using the back of a spoon flatten out slightly. 
4. Cook the patties for about 3 minutes on either side.