Whey too many cupcakes

With a fridge full of cupcakes, the idea of ginger cupcakes was floated, and I just had to make more. I didn't feel like doing all the work for some of the more scrumptious ginger cupcake recipes I found, so I figured I'd just adjust the original vegan chocolate cupcake recipe.

Of course, I couldn't deal with just using water, so I whipped up a quick batch of cheese just for the whey. I can always count on a rich base if I replace water with whey...and I wasn't disappointed. I usually use 2 cups milk with 2 TB vinegar for quick fixes like this one.

I also took the opportunity to halve the recipe and test it in my mini-cupcake pans. Perfect! Although I guess it goes without saying that these aren't even vegetarian, what with the whey...

Mini-batch Chocolate/Ginger Cupcakes
Ingredients:
dry: 1/2 cup + 1 TB flour | 1/2 cup sugar | 2 TB unsweetened cocoa powder | 1 tsp ginger | 1 tsp pumpkin pie spice | 1/2 tsp baking soda | 1/4 tsp salt
wet: 1/2 cup warm whey | 1/2 tsp vanilla extract | 2 TB + 2 tsp vegetable oil
1/2 tsp distilled white vinegar
Mix dry ingredients with a fork. Add wet ingredients, except vinegar, and blend completely.
Add vinegar and immediately spoon batter into an ungreased cupcake pan, filling each section about halfway.
Bake at 350° for 20 minutes. Cool completely, and use a knife to loosen the sides. They should fall right out. Silicon pans make this even easier!

These came out so great that I made another half-batch with chopped mint in place of the spices, and using only rice flour. I have such high hopes for rice flour, but it tends to have only contempt for me. The flour didn't dissolve very well (one problem was that the liquid was room temp, not warm), making the end result a little gritty. Oh, and I forgot I was making a half-batch when I added the coca powder, so I really can't blame the rice flour for the heavy little buggers we ended up with.