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It's Guilt-Free!

(why do i like making cupcakes out of cake recipes? simple: portion control!)

Sugar-free Chocolate Cupcakes

Chocolate cake. What more can I say? A soft, moist and fudgy treat that everyone loves! And the best part about these batch of cupcakes I made is that they’re sugar-free!

Over the last few years, I have tried various chocolate cake recipes in search of the perfect one. I have always wanted it soft – but not as airy and fluffy as sponge or chiffon. Maybe more like butter cake – dense enough to hold its moisture and suitable for light soaking in some alcohol. Then comes the perfect icing – rich, fudgy and indulgent.

I grew up eating the rich dark, almost black chocolate cake from Cookie Monster’s Bake Shop. It was so rich and sweet and moist! My father would always buy one whole, eat only a spoonful then give away the rest of the cake! Being a diabetic is never easy!

My aunt makes a similar cake that she makes for me during my childhood birthday parties. It wasn’t as dense as Cookie Monster’s, but equally indulgent because of its rich creamy icing (recipe below). She makes a chocolate chiffon iced with condensed milk icing.

For today, the following recipe is one I modified from Alton Brown’s baking book (Chocolate Fudge Cake). His recipe is a bit weird at first in that he pulverizes the baking chocolate to tiny bits and adds them to the flour. But then it makes sense: the bits melt during cooking and become the “fudge” in the cake. I’ve made this cake several times, and I once added the chocolate melted into the butter. The cake came out okay too, although a bit denser.

This recipe works best with BROWN sugar. If you can’t find a brown sugar substitute, then use the ordinary (white) sugar substitute. I could not find one, so I just used an equivalent amount of regular (white) granulated isomalt. (NOTE: excessive consumption of isomalt may lead to diarrhea.)

No, I do not need to go on a diet. I am not overweight, yet. So why did I make it sugar-free this time? Because my dad has been nagging me to. He IS on a diet.

Cake
Preheat oven 350°F. Prepare cake pans. If making a cake, line a 9x3 inch cake pan with parchment. If making cupcakes, line 24 muffin tins with paper.

In a mixer, combine 2 cups isomalt (or brown sugar/ dark brown sugar if you don’t need this to be sugar-free) and ½ cup butter. Beat until well combined. Beat in two eggs, one at a time, and also 1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract.

In a food processor, pulverize 3 oz (three squares) of unsweetened chocolate (or baking chocolate for diabetic). Add in the dry ingredients: 2 ¼ cups all purpose flour, 2 teaspoons baking soda, one teaspoon salt and 3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder.

Now add the dry ingredients to the butter and egg mixture, alternating with 1 cup sour cream, starting and ending with the dry ingredients. Mixture will be very sticky. Do not overbeat. Mix only until combine.

With the mixer running on the lowest setting, slowly add in 1 cup boiling water. This will thin out the mixture.

Pour batter on cake pan or muffin tins. Bake the cake at 350 for ½ an hour, reduce temperature to 300 then finish baking for another half hour. Toothpick inserted will come out wet – this is after all a fudge cake! Cake made from white sugar or sugar substitute will not be as fudgy. But cake will be springy when lightly touched. For cupcakes, bake them at 350 for 10 minutes then 300 for another 20 minutes or so.

Remove from oven and cool in pan for 15 minutes before unmoulding. Cool completely before icing.

Icing
Sugar-free: melt two oz unsweetened chocolate, ¼ cup butter and 1 cup milk or cream. Cool. Add in 2 cups icing sugar substitute (isomalt) and whip in a mixer until icing holds shape.

Traditional icing: on a double boiler, mix together one can (1 cup) condensed milk, 1 cup fresh milk or cream, three oz unsweetened chocolate, and three tablespoons. Cook until thickened (same consistency as the condensed milk before you added it.), stirring occasionally. This usually takes around 45 minutes to 1 hour when using a double boiler. Cooking time is excruciatingly slow, but is not prone to overcooking or burning. I usually cook this over direct flame – low-medium, and with CONSTANT vigorous stirring. It’s a nasty workout for your arms but cooking time takes only 15 or 20 minutes.

I usually make big batches of this traditional icing and store them in the freezer.

To ice the cake, cut cake in the center and fill with some icing. Spread the remaining over the top and sides.

To ice cupcakes, spoon icing over top and spread.

(let the cupcakes cool on the pan a few minutes prior to unmoulding.)

(moist and fluffy - not bad for something sugar-free!)