It is, however, the end of farmer’s market season, and I have been making some awesome gazpacho.

The recipe:

2 cans V8 (I am lazy. It is delicious.)
1 very small vidalia onion
1 large carrot
1/3 c cilantro
1 serrano pepper, chopped
1/3 c red wine vinegar
1/8 c olive oil
1/2 red bell pepper, cut into bite size pieces
2-3 avocados, cubed
1 small tomato, diced
1 small cucumber, cubed
4 oz cream cheese, cubed

First, combine the carrot, serrano, and cilantro in your food processor until they are somewhere between crumbs and paste. Dump them in a bowl and add both cans of V8. Dice your onion, throw that in. Add the oil and vinegar. Mix well! (add more oil and vinegar to taste if necessary). Let sit overnight (or just proceed with the recipe if you are impatient).

The next day add everything else. Pretty simple. I like to add the cream cheese right before I eat it, or have it out for folks to choose to add. It makes really fantastic bites of wonderful.

The end!

No pictures, my camera is somewhere in a moving box.

These were really surprising little cupcakes. I made them for someone who was said to love avocados. Although I did find a recipe for avocado cupcakes as well as frosting, I didn’t want to push it with my taste testers.  As a fruit (I think?) the avocado is undeniably sweet and creamy. It holds up extremely well as a base for frosting, and combines with chocolate just as well s pretty much anything else on the planet.

Recipe for cupcakes is here.

The frosting:

1 ripe avocado
1 tsp. lemon juice
4 cups (ish) icing sugar
1 tsp. vanilla

I tend to use less powdered sugar than the recipe calls for, which is why my frosting turned out so very, very green. I say start with less and do it to your own taste.

This is a wonderful carrot cake recipe.

Last night I attempted to cook a Thai coconut soup with sweet sticky rice and mangoes. It turns out that lemongrass is my worst enemy and I have no concept of how many chilies are too many chilies. The soup was crunchy and strange and sour and spicy and so many unappetizing things. The rice was mediocre. I fixed the horrible situation with cupcakes.

To compliment my Thai dinner (yes okay sweet sticky rice isn’t dinner), which was full of lime and coconut (never ever look at the saturated fat content of coconut, it will make you so sad), I went with the Coconut Lime cupcake recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World. It is now my favorite kind of cupcake. The lime buttercream frosting is so refreshing, and the cupcake is the sweetest, fluffiest, chewiest (good kind of chewy), moistest bit of happiness that has ever lived in my fridge for 24 hours.

The Cupcakes:

• 1 cup vegetable shortening
• 2 eggs
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 teaspoon cocoa powder
• 1 ounce food coloring, 2 tsp red (to combat the green color the blue takes on)
• 2 1/2 cups cake flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup buttermilk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F and line cupcake tins.
2. Cream together the shortening, eggs and sugar. In a separate small bowl, mix together the cocoa and food coloring. Add the paste to the shortening mixture. Sift the flour and salt together, add to the batter alternately with the buttermilk. Add the vanilla extract. Fold in the baking soda and vinegar. Pour the batter into cupcake pans. Bake for 22-25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Let cool on a cooling rack before frosting.

The Frosting:

• 1/2 pound cream cheese, softened
• 1 stick butter, softened
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 cups sifted confectioners’ sugar

1. Cream ingredients together and frost cupcakes!

These cupcakes were definitely the hit of the party. They were also the prettiest cupcakes because they were the ones I made when I finally figured out how to use a star tip on a pastry bag. Hooray! The recipe I’m posting is a variation from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World. I make them with chai concentrate instead of tea bags because I have a hard time trusting random brands of tea from the store. I have some really gross teas, and I have learned from my mistakes.

The Cupcake:

• 3/4 c chai concentrate
• 1/4 c soy milk
• 1/4 c canola oil
• 1/2 c soy yogurt
• 1 1/3 c flour
• 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line muffin pans.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the oil, yogurt, sugar, vanilla, and tea mixture until all yogurt lumps disappear. Sift flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt into wet ingredients. Mix until large lumps disappear
3. Bake 22-25 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean

The Frosting:

• 2 tablespoons chai concentrate
• 1/3 c butter, softened
• 2 c confectioners sugar
• 1 tbsp 2 tsp cold soy milk

1. Cream the butter in a large bowl using an electric mixer until fluffy. Add confectioners’ sugar, and continue creaming until well blended.
2. Pour tea into cold milk; beat milk into frosting until incorporated. Continue beating frosting until fluffy.

Frost the cupcakes once they’ve cooled and you will have a truly lovely treat.

So that photograph may or may not be a sign that I could not get a decent photograph of the group. I need to step it up a notch in the photo department.

These cupcakes are a variation my ex roommate Courtney made on a family recipe for Applesauce Cupcakes. They are wonderful, to say the least. They are one of many cupcakes at my party which featured cream cheese frosting. I made a conscious decision not to make white frosting for any because I think cream cheese is better in every way. And it was my party.

The Cupcake:

• 1 1/4 c flour
• 1 c sugar
• 1/4 tsp baking powder
• 3/4 tsp baking soda
• 3/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 c shortening
• 1/4 c water
• 3/4 c sour cream
• 1 egg

1. Cream together egg, shortening, and sugar. Add other ingredients alternately. Bake at 350 degrees for about 25 minutes.

The Frosting:

• 1/2 pound cream cheese, softened
• 1 stick butter, softened
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 cups sifted confectioners’ sugar

1. Blend all ingredients together… pretty simple.

THESE ARE SO GOOD.

Vegan cornbread style cupcakes with honey frosting and a toasted sesame seed garnish. The cupcakes were delicious, but the frosting could use some work. I used Tofutti cream cheese to make it, which unfortunately has a funny aftertaste. It was also pretty runny. If there is a better vegan cream cheese I would love to hear about it. Alternately, these would probably be delicious with either straight butter or honey, traditional cornbread style.

The Cupcake:

• 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup yellow cornmeal
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar, and 1/4 cup for sprinkling
• 1/2 cup soy milk
• 1/2 tsp apple cider vinegar
• 1/3 c oil
• 7 tablespoons Earth Balance, melted

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Whisk vinegar into soy milk and set aside to curdle. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, cornmeal, baking powder, salt, and 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar. In another bowl, whisk together soy milk, eggs, and melted butter; pour over flour mixture, whisking to combine..
2. Bake 22-25 minutes, allow to cool before frosting.

The Frosting:

• 1/2 cup earth balance, very soft
• 6-8 ounces vegan cream cheese
• 1/4 cup honey

Blend together with a mixer, try to avoid overblending, as the cream cheese tends to break down and get a little liquidy.

Frost lightly and top with a few toasted sesame seeds.

The week before Cupcake Day, I was at the library and Martha Stewart’s Cupcake Book. I figured there had to be at least one standard chocolate cupcake. You really have to hand it to Martha, her cupcakes rise beautifully.

The Cupcake:

• 3 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 cup boiling water
• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 2 cups sugar
• 5 large eggs
• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup buttermilk
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1. Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Line the bottom of two 12-cup muffin tins with paper liners.
2. Melt chocolate in a double boiler over simmering water. In a bowl, stir baking soda into the boiling water; stir this mixture into chocolate. Set aside to cool slightly.
3. Using an electric mixer, cream butter and sugar until the mixture is light and pale yellow in color. Add eggs, one at a time, and continue to mix until thoroughly incorporated. Add flour and buttermilk, alternating between small amounts of each, and blend well.
4. Add the melted chocolate and vanilla to the batter, and stir well. Pour the batter into the paper cups, and bake until a cake tester comes out clean when inserted into the center of a cupcake, about 30 minutes. Remove cupcakes from the oven, and allow them to cool briefly in the muffin tin before removing them to a wire rack to cool completely. Ice, and serve.

The Frosting:

• 8 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
• 1 cup heavy cream

1. Melt chocolate with cream in a heavy saucepan, and cook over very low heat until the mixture is smooth and glossy.
2. Transfer the mixture to a bowl, and refrigerate until cooled but not too firm, 30 to 45 minutes.
3. Using a handheld mixer, beat on high speed until thick and creamy. Use immediately.

Martha tops these with lovely chocolate curls. Because I fail at making those, mine ended up topped with some strange shaved chocolate bits. You can see the final product in the pictures featuring all the cupcakes, I neglected to take a picture of the finished product up close. It is hard to remember to take pictures when you have been baking for the entire day.

Note: I always end up with extra frosting. I ended up keeping the remainder of the ganache for hot fudge on ice cream. Works like a charm!

These cupcakes are a take on a blueberry lemon tart. For the cupcakes I used the Golden Vanilla Cupcakes from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World. Any other basic cupcake would do the trick, although I think avoiding sugary sweet cupcakes would be the best idea.

The custard:

From Allrecipes.com