White Cupcakes With Variations (Spice)

Making desserts without added fat can be quite challenging. In the end, you just have to accept the fact that a no-oil-added dessert is going to have a distinctly different character than something made with shortening, margarine, butter, or oil. Once you decide you are okay with that concept, a whole new world of baking opens up, and if you are like me, over time you actually begin to prefer the heartier, earthier flavors of a cupcake or quick bread made with whole grain flours, and not saturated with oil. The "White Cupcakes With Variations" (page 459) were a big hit in my house, although with the alterations I made, they ended up resembling a muffin more than a cupcake. But there you have it - keeping it healthy does by default change the nature of the end product. A very basic recipe, these "cupcake muffins" consist of nothing more than flour, soymilk (turned into "buttermilk" with the addition of vinegar), sugar, leavening, and vanilla extract. Of course the recipe does call for oil, but instead I used applesauce with excellent results. There are three possible variations to the basic white cupcake, as the recipe would suggest: Coconut, Lemon, and Spice (and I wonder, do the variations count in the final tally of 1000 recipes?). I opted to make the spice variety, and also topped them with my own version of the "Buttercream Frosting".  

 

"Keeping it McDougall Friendly" checklist:

 

ü  Use whole wheat pastry flour instead of all-purpose flour (aka white flour).

 

ü   Instead of using ¼ cup oil, use ¼ to 1/3 cup apple sauce. This is especially nice in the spice variety of this recipe.

 

ü  If you aren't using cupcake liners in your muffin tin, use a non-stick tin such as one made from silicone. Paper liners tend to stick to products cooked without oil initially, but after storing a day or two, will peel off easily.