We’re getting down to the wire now, and if you’re still putting off preparations for Valentine’s Day at this point, there’s a good chance that your procrastination will carry you straight to the 14th without a gift in sight. Lame excuses are easy to procure too, such as not being able to find anything “special” enough, or getting to the store too late, so it’s understandable why most would give up. Before you turn your back on the holiday though, think about how much it might mean to at least your family members if you gave them just a small reminder of how you appreciate them, even if it’s just a regular day in your book. Quick, don’t sit around with your hands inactive, get your butt into your kitchen because it’s not too late!

Tantalizing, aren’t they? Well, would you believe that you can make them in under 30 minutes, using leftover frosting? It’s true and it couldn’t be easier – Even the most cooking-challenged among us can whip out these decadent bon bons in no time!

Making so many cupcakes as of late, I’ve become accustomed to mixing up frosting in extra large batches with which to pipe swirls and squiggles to my heart’s content. It was only a matter of time before I had more containers of leftover frosting in my fridge than actual food. Attempting to remedy a severe storage shortage, I thought long and hard about what else the sweet topping could be used as, and with small experimentation and alterations, I found that it turns out to be similar consistency to the traditionally ganache center of a truffle.

Grab a note pad and get ready to take some fast notes, because here’s how it goes down: Take out your leftover frosting of any flavor from the fridge, where it should have sat for long enough to become thoroughly chilled and slightly stiff. Depending on how much you have to work with, stir in an extra 1 – 3 cups of confectioner’s sugar, combining thoroughly, until you end up with something akin to playdough (Very thick and malleable, but not so sugar-saturated that it becomes crumbly.)

In the microwave, melt down a cup or two of dark chocolate along with a generous pat of margarine to form a basic ganache. Stir until entirely smooth and emulsified. Roll about a tablespoon of your dough into a sphere – It doesn’t have to be perfect, but generally rounded is good. Drop the ball into your ganache, coat quickly (Being margarine based, it will dissolve from the heat if you wait too long!) Fish it out the a fork, allow to drip off the excess chocolate for a few seconds and place on a silpat to dry. Repeat with remaining dough until you run out, and let the chocolate-covered bon bons to cool before touching again. If you’re in a real hurry, you can place it in the fridge to solidify faster. Once dry, carefully remove from silpat and nestle into mini-cupcake liners. Pack away into an attractive box to surprise someone special with.

What’s could be better than a creamy, chocolate-coated sweet of absolutely any flavor imaginable? That also means it’s a snap to pull together a chocolate box with numerous different centers hiding within a ganache shell, ready to surprise and put a smile on someone’s face. Just think of the possibilities: Mint, cookies ‘n creme, strawberry, double chocolate… anything. These pictured in particular happen conceal lemony coconut cores, in which extra coconut can certainly make a welcome addition. Health-wise, they may not be the best thing for your diet, but they are still gluten-free, so get into the spirit and share them around with everyone. It’s not like it would be hard to make more!

Unassuming from afar, tempting upon closer inspection, and hauntingly delicious at first bite. All the signs would seem to say that these are your typically tasty peanut butter cookies; Full of nutty flavor, soft and chewy, yet still satisfyingly crisp. Certainly every aspect of this classification is accurate, although there is something slightly different about these that most people wouldn’t even venture to guess.

Before I give away the secret ingredient, allow me to preface expressing my disdain for the general reaction when you label something as “healthier.” The first thought that passes through the American mind is that something essential to the overall flavor has been removed, so it must therefore be not nearly as good tasting. Despite the fact that vegan baking and cooking still makes use of plenty of sugar, oil, and other items with less-than-stellar reputations, the uneducated public still see veganism as consisting only of sterile, bland health food, which is no where near the truth. Connecting these dots, I almost never divulge the fact that my baked goods are all vegan before handing them out to anyone. There’s nothing that makes vegan food any more or less inherently tasty than the alternative anyway – It all comes down to the same basic ingredients to contribute flavor, and it’s just a matter of how you choose utilize them. That’s why I will never accept the response that something is “good for vegan food;” Perfectionist that I am, I will continue working at a recipe until it is delicious in its own right.

That said, due to a growing demand for delicious food suitable for those with usually limited dietary constraints, the pressure to make more healthful treats was on, big time. Without suffering from any medical limitations other than lactose intolerance as a child, (Obviously, no longer an issue) I frantically read through stacks of articles and recipes, trying to gather more information about celiac’s disease. Although this is only my first attempt at fulfilling such a daunting task, I plan to delve further into this field should it be requested in the future.

So yes, these cookies are indeed not only vegan as per usual, but also gluten-free. In addition, if one were baking for a diabetic, I could imagine the sugar can even be replaced with Splenda or stevia, although I’m not sure the exact conversion from stevia to regular white sugar, as the former is much sweeter than the later.

Health food? I guess you could say that. Delicious? You could say that one again. In such a biased and prejudiced world out there, millions would write this one off because of its secret ingredients, which is why I’m not going to focus on that. See for yourself, but I don’t think they should be looked upon any differently than white flour or salt; Ingredients are just that, better or for worse, and even the most unexpected ingredients can be used the right way to create something amazing.

Gluten-Free Peanut Butter Cookies

Ingredients:

1/2 Cup Red Lentils, Dry

1/4 Cup Instant Mashed Potato Flakes

1/2 Cup Soymilk

1 Cup Crunchy Peanut Butter

3/4 Cup Sugar

1/4 Cup Cornstarch

2 Teaspoons Cream of Tartar

1 Teaspoon Baking Soda

1 Teaspoon Vanilla

1/4 Teaspoon Salt

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Begin by grinding up your dry lentils in a food processor for a good 5 – 10 minutes, or until it is a fine powder. This step is crucial, as any remaining pieces of whole lentils will contribute a slightly off texture to the finished cookie. While that’s churning away, combine the soymilk and mashed potato flakes in a microwave-safe bowl and heat for one minute. Let it cool for a minute or two, and toss it into a stand mixer along with your lentil flour.

Mix in the peanut butter and sugar next. Sprinkle in your cornstarch while keeping the mixer at a low speed, bringing it up faster once it’s well combined and no longer threatens to send starch flying out. Make sure that it’s thoroughly mixed at this point, because lumps of cornstarch do not make nice prizes.

Add in the remaining ingredient, combine, and spoon out onto silpat-lined baking sheets.

Leave a good amount of room between cookies in case of spreading, but they shouldn’t go too far. Slide the dough lumps into the oven and cook for 10-12 minutes. Removing them from the hot box, allow them to sit on the hot tray for another 5 minutes before pull the silpat off onto a cooler surface, where they should come down to room temperature.

Depending on the size, you will end up with approximately two dozen cookies to enjoy and share with all.

Printable Recipe

Ah, lazy Sundays. In spite of a steadily growing to-do list, little ever gets accomplished for some reason on the last day of the weekend. Waking up bleary eyed, hours later than usual, the last thing I wanted to do was tackle the sprawling mess of fabric that was left unfinished on the sewing room floor. No, although I had promised myself I would diversify my crafting posts, looking back into old categories that have begun to accumulate dust from inactivity, the most I could do was drag myself down to the kitchen and start heating up the oven once again.

Still in a sloth-like daze, I hadn’t even prepared myself to write a new post, but I got such lovely pictures of my baked goods, I can’t not show them off. In addition, I feel so bad about not having any new recipes to share ever since purchasing Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, so I finally have something of my own creation included. Obviously inspired by Isa’s Coconut Heaven frosting, I toyed with it to create a more sturdy “butter cream” and incorporate a contrasting flavor to add interest over all.

But before I got around to that, the best part of waking up is always chocolate, especially in cupcake form.

After the oven was already warm, I figured I might as well try out one of the few cupcake recipes from Vegan with a Vengeance, and Coconut Heaven cupcakes resulted.

Guess who got a new set of pastry tips and bags for their birthday?

As if you couldn’t see that coming.

A couple hundred years ago, I did in fact take a class on decorating cakes, but inadequate tools prevented me from practicing or retaining anything I learned. Now I’m re-teaching myself, trial and error, leaving a path of splattered frosting in my wake. I swear, one could have sold tickets to watch me simply trying to fill the pastry bag: A half hour long spectacle of the wrong way to even contemplate going about it! Needless to say, copious curses could be heard emanating from the kitchen as I fought to the death with that plastic cone. Thankfully, I ultimately emerged the victor.

Much of the difficulty lay in manipulating the frosting itself, because I had allowed the margarine to defrost on the counter all morning, and by the time I returned from school, I found the yellow sticks to be as soft as mashed potatoes. Barely capable of resisting even the most gentle prodding, I foolishly hoped for the best and tossed them into my stand mixer, worried about time constraints as I was. Yes, it worked out alright… But it was a beast to smooth over the double-decker cake. Not as cooperative in exiting my pastry bag as I had wanted either, but I recovered by switching up the border designs to slightly less complicated configurations.

It’s a little hard to tell from these shots, but this was also my first attempt at using a cake comb. So very excited, but I was ill prepared for such a venture. With no lazy suzan to turn the cake, I rotated it by hand, pressing the comb gently to the exterior, but the results were uneven and lumpy. Going back over it applying more pressure, I achieved something almost uniform in appearance, but in some places the comb dug in too deep and actually sheared off crumbs of the underlying layers. Ah well, can’t expect the first time to be perfect, and it was nothing that more frosting couldn’t fix anyway.

The cake unlucky enough to be subjected to my experiments was actually for my little cousin, who happens to be celebrating her 13th birthday this weekend. Wanting to appeal to her grown-up taste buds, I used the cappuccino cupcake recipe originally found in VCToTW, doubled, and baked in two 8” cake pans. The frosting is a basic chocolate vegan buttercream, with a dash of additional instant coffee powder for a slightly mocha flavor. Sandwiched between the two layers resides the same frosting, because I ran out of time to make a different filling, but I don’t think that anyone was too upset about this transgression.