Gluten & Milk Free Dolphin Chocolate Birthday Cupcakes

THEY ARE HERE :-D

A friend of mine and her partner's little girl is also a celiac.  She asked me to make some gluten free cupcakes for her for her birthday.  I was also given the instructions that she was not into pink and girly things, but rather sports, sailing, dolphins etc....  One of the things that really really frustrates me about Germany is the lack of things available to buy for cake/cupcake baking/decorating.  They have a very very small selection of items to decorate.  So, I had to try to find something that would work.  I searched and finally found some gluten free dolphin gummy bears and then some plastic little dolphins.  I think the next time I go back to the states or have someone come over, I will have a long list of decorating supplies to get :-)

So, here it is, the recipe that is so amazing, you will want to make it all the time. These chocolate cupcakes are so close to normal devils food cupcakes (made with wheat flour, butter and milk) that you will not know the difference!!!   Oh, I will admit though, the batch that is in the picture unfrosted - I had used a bit less flour in those (only about 10g less) and it made a huge difference.  When I made them again using 10g more -they were nice and rounded. No caving in on the top ;-)

For the Cupcakes:

20g Amaranth Flour

20g Millet Flour

34g White Rice Flour

16g Tapioca starch

1/8 teaspoon Baking Soda

1 teaspoon Baking Powder (if using German, use 2x amount)

40g Baking Cocoa Powder

Pinch of salt

25g Margarine at room temperature (I used sanella)

140 g Mascobado Sugar

1 Egg at room temperature

½ teaspoon Pure Vanilla Extract

½ cup Soy Milk at room temperature (I used Alpro soya natural fresh)

Preheat oven to  180°C (350°F)

In a large bowl - mix the margarine, sugar, vanilla, egg and soy milk together until blended. 

In a smaller bowl – mix the remaining ingredients and sift several times.  I usually sift at least 3x.

Pour the flour mixture into the wet ingredients and mix with a spoon until the flour is all mixed into the wet mixture.  Then beat on medium speed with a mixer for 1-2 minutes.

Fill cupcakes liners 2/3 full.  I drop the cupcake pan then a couple times on a flat surface to get any air bubbles out.

Put into heated oven and DO NOT OPEN THE DOOR until the timer goes off - Bake for 17 minutes.  Check with a toothpick. 

Cool for 10 minutes before removing from the cupcake tin.  Place cupcakes on a wire rack to cool completely.  When completely cooled, you can frost them.

Butter Cream Frosting:

I used the Wilton Recipe but altered as follows to make it milk free.

113g Margarine at room temperature - again, used Sanella

113g Crisco or other shortening

1 teaspoon Pure Vanilla Extract

520g Powdered Sugar (shifted)

2 tablespoons Soy Milk (again, used the fresh Alpro)

Cream the margarine and shortening together then add the vanilla.  Mix.  Then add the powdered sugar approx 1 cup at a time.  Then add the soy milk.  Adjust milk/powdered sugar to get consistency needed.

What I did differently:

I tried this recipe 4x in varying amounts of different ingredients.  I also did something I very rarely ever do - I used rice flour.  I typically do not like using rice flour, but I think that is my 10 years old "rice, tapioca, potato" mix that just never works for me.  Using it with other flours worked quite well.  

I also did not do my usual mixing between ingredients.  I did a lot of reading on other blogs and found many others have found the same thing - 1 bowl mixing (or as little as possible) actually is better for gluten free baking.  One of the points of mixing so long in normal recipes is to release the gluten. We have none, so mixing is actually bad for us ;-)

What I would do differently:

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!!!  I can not believe how absolutely perfect these turned out. I did this same recipe 3x after getting it right and turned out 100% each time.