Banana Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Frosting

I am a huge fan of the show Cupcake Wars. Seriously, it is a bit of an obsession. We don't have cable at my house, but whenever I visit my folks or my in-laws I make sure to watch the episodes or I catch up online. I love how creative these bakers can be and it inspires me to get more creative. A couple years ago the 1st ever Vegan chef appeared on the show, Chloe Coscarelli. While up against 4 other professional pastry chefs she won by a landslide because he flavors were incredible. Can you guess why? Because she uses all natural plant-based products and even the pickiest palate can distinguish real food from the processed stuff.

After deciding to get back in the swing of my Vegan lifestyle the other day I started looking for cookbooks that made going Vegan easy. When I saw that Ms. Coscarelli had her own cookbook out I was elated and bought it right away.

http://www.amazon.com/Chloes-Kitchen-Delicious-Recipes-Making/dp/1451636741/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1390105530&sr=1-1&keywords=chloe%27s+kitchen

Now while I'm still a number 1 fan of Lindsay Nixon and her low-fat Vegan recipes for my optimum health, Chloe's use of unprocessed plant oils adds a little something to her food, especially her desserts. I will be adding many recipes to this blog as I make them. Everything I've made so far I've quite enjoyed. Plus, her awesome instructions taught me how to finally press Tofu and I love it now.

When I found out that my dear friend Trish from church had a birthday coming up, I knew I had to make one of Chloe's award-winning cupcakes. I wanted to bring the best dessert possible with the healthiest ingredients I could. I made the Banana cupcakes from the book with a little modification. I used virgin coconut oil in place of the vegan shortening. Also, rather than using the lemon icing from the book I chose to make some peanut butter frosting. You will find both my recipes below. These were amazing. Trish loved them as did many others that of course are very skeptical of vegan food.

Ingredients

Banana Cupcakes
2 cups all purpose flour (I used unbleached enriched white flour, but any should work)
1 cup organic and/or raw sugar
1tsp. baking powder
1-2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp. ground cloves
1/2 tsp. ground ginger
1 cup mashed ripe bananas
1 cup canned lite coconut milk
1/2 cup melted coconut oil
2 tsp. apple cider vinegar
1 Tb. pure Vanilla extract

Peanut Butter Frosting
2 cups organic powdered sugar, sifted before putting into mixture
1/2 cup virgin coconut oil
1 cup smooth all natural peanut butter
5 Tbs. vanilla almond milk (this you can adjust based on your consistency preference)

Instructions
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 cupcake pans with 18 paper liners
2. In a large bowl mix together all dry ingredients
3. In a separate smaller bowl combine banana and wet ingredients
4. Pour the wet mixture into the dry mixture and mix until just incorporated, don't overmix or it will lose it's fluffiness
5. Fill the cupcake liners 3/4 of the way full
6. Bake for 18 to 20 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean in the center of the cupcake
7. Cool on a cooling rack completely before adding the frosting.

8. In a medium size bowl with an electic hand mixer or in stand mixer, combine all frosting ingredients.
9. Whisk until uniform
10. Place frosting into a piping bag and add frosting in design of your liking to the top of the cupcakes. I had lots of leftover frosting.... it makes an excellent toast spread or waffle syrup drizzle

Now serve this to any willing party, they will love you forever and beg for the recipe.