links for 2007-12-07

Mexican Chocolate Doughnuts

So today was the bake-off at Cosmo’s Vegan Shoppe. I’m not one to develop my own recipes, but for the fun of it thought I’d go ahead and enter something. Since my last doughnut experience was good, I thought I’d work out the mini doughnut pan and try to see if I could come up with chocolate doughnuts. But I’m always looking for an excuse to mix chilies and chocolate, so I thought Mexican Chocolate Doughnuts!

My mini doughnut pan came with a chocolate doughnut recipe so I started with that, subbed the animal bits and tossed in some cinnamon. For the ganache, I used the recipe in Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World and tossed in some chili powder. I felt like the doughnuts were a little bit denser, heavier than I would like. I think next time I try them I will half the egg replacer and try something else like maybe souring the soy milk with vinegar. But no matter what I thought, the little guys won Most Creative Recipe! Yay! I got a medal and an apron and a cook book as prizes. Yipee! I was really surprised, but after I tasted the other entries I was even more surprised. There were no “losers” there. Everything was super nummy. Hooray for vegans!

mexican chocolate doughnuts

Mexican Chocolate Doughnuts

for doughnuts
1 ½ cups flour
⅓ cup cocoa
1 teaspoon baking powder
⅛ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon cinnamon
3 teaspoons EnergE Egg Replacer, whisked with 4 tablespoons of warm water
⅔ cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
½ cup plain soymilk
2 tablespoons Earth Balance, melted

for ganache
⅛ cup soy milk
2 ounces semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 tablespoon maple syrup
¼ teaspoon chili powder (ground chilies, not the spice mix)

Preheat oven to 325 F.

Lightly spray mini doughnut pan with cooking spray. Combine flour, cocoa, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. In another bowl, mix egg replacer mixture, sugar, vanilla, soy milk and Earth Balance until well mixed. Add flour mixture to wet mixture a little at a time until mixed. Fill each doughnut mold about 2/3 full. You may need to spread with your finger to even out. Bake for 8 minutes. If you’re using a full sized doughnut pan you will need to bake longer. Cool slightly. Remove carefully and continue cooling on a rack.

When doughnuts are cool, make Chili Chocolate Ganache. Bring soy milk to a boil in a small pan. Remove from heat and add chili powder, chocolate and maple syrup. Mix with a spatula until melted and smooth. Drizzle over tops of doughnuts with a spoon.

2007 vegan bakeoff medal

Control your own salt, or not

Apparently THE health story this week was salt and that the FDA is considering putting limits on the salt allowed in processed foods. I tend to have NBC on the TV while I’m getting ready for work. Occasionally, if I’m late, I’ll catch some of the Today Show. Whoever is in charge of their health reporting is not that bright. In my last rant about them, I pointed out that they took that “pregnant women need to eat more fish” study at face value even though it was funded by the seafood industry. Now, on this salt story, I didn’t hear them once suggest that you buy fewer processed foods. I wonder why that is? Is it maybe because it would piss off their advertisers? Hmmm, I wonder? Anyway, this U.S. News and World Report story makes “cooking from scratch” the first suggestion on how to cut salt out of your diet. Well, duh. See, now how hard was that? But it gets even better. Apparently this is a non issue anyway. Check out Junk Food Science’s detailed analysis of the issue.