Trying to find baked cupcakes at the store that are gluten and dairy free is difficult.
I decided to try and make a batch of mini chocolate peanut butter cup cupcakes myself to share with my little one and family on her third birthday.
Although these little cupcakes don’t exactly taste like cake, but more so like brownies I decided why not post the recipe anyways.
They do taste good and who knows maybe someone else out there looking for a gluten and dairy free treat options for a birthday or other special occasion might be able to use it.
The Ingredients Needed for the Cupcakes
- ¾ cup of all purpose gluten free flour
- ⅜ teaspoon of xanthan gum
- 7 tablespoons of unsweetened dark baking cocoa
- ¼ teaspoon of sea salt
- ¼ teaspoon of baking soda
- ½ cup of raw sugar
- ⅜ cup of dairy free sour cream (you can get this at any whole food grocery store)
- ¼ cup of vegetable oil
- 1 egg
- Teaspoon of vanilla extract
- ⅜ cup of warm water
- ½ cup of mini chocolate chips, peanut butter chips, or mini reese’s peanut butter cup baking morsels
Steps for Making the Mini Cupcakes
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and line the mini cupcake pan with cupcake liners. You can find mini cupcake liners at any grocery store in the baking isle.
- Carefully measure out all the dry ingredients and mix them in one bowl.
- In another bowl carefully measure out the wet ingredients and mix them together.
- Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and blend them together using a mixer for about a minute.
- Carefully scoop the chocolaty thick batter into the mini muffin pan. Fill each cupcake spot up as much as possible with the batter.
- Bake the mini cupcakes in the 350 degree oven for about 15 to 20 minutes. Constantly check on these once you reach 15 minutes because you don’t want to over bake them or dry them out. As soon as you can place a toothpick into one and have the toothpick come out clean they are ready to come out.
- Remove the cupcakes from the oven and allow them to completely cool for about 30 minutes to an hour before frosting them.
Basic Peanut Butter Frosting
The peanut butter frosting is super simple to make. All you need for ingredients are:
- Cup of creamy peanut butter
- ⅛ cup of vanilla almond milk
- Teaspoon of vanilla extract
- 1 ½ cups of confectioners sugar
To make the frosting, place all the ingredients into a mixing bowl and beat with a mixer on medium to high speed for about a minute. If you find the frosting needs to be thicker add in more confectioners sugar until you reach the consistency you are looking for in your frosting.
If you find the frosting is too thick go ahead and slowly add in a tablespoon of almond milk until it thins out a bit, but do not add too much almond milk or the frosting will become too soft to use.
Once the frosting is ready go ahead and frost your mini cupcakes however you desire. I like to scoop my frosting into a frosting tube and squeeze it out onto the cupcakes.
You can use a butter knife and frost the cupcakes that way.
End Thoughts to Keep in Mind
Once you have put your cupcakes together you may decorate them however you choose. For my daughter’s birthday she loves the gold coins you get during Christmas time so I decorated hers with some of those along with mini marshmallows and gummies.
Go ahead and be creative and use whatever you have on hand to make your mini cupcakes special and don’t forget to have fun while making them.