Recipe: Vegan Chocolate Baked Donuts

Sometimes, you just have to start your day with some delicious chocolate donuts. Mmmmm donuts~

Ingredients (makes 6 donuts):

For donuts:

• 1 cup of flour
• 1/4 cup of cocoa powder
• 1/2 teaspoonful of baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoonful of salt
• 1/2 cup of sugar
• 1/2 cup of almond milk
• 1/4 cup of apple sauce (or mashed bananas)
• 4 tablespoonfuls of coconut oil (melted/clear)
• 1 teaspoonful of vanilla extract

Chocolate "glaze":

• 4 tablespoonfuls of cocoa powder
• 1/4 teaspoonful of salt
• dash of agave nectar
• almond milk- amount depending on consistency
• white sugar- amount depending on taste
• Toppings of your choice: almond chips, coconut shreds, sprinkles, chocolate chips, etc!

Directions:

• Preheat your oven to 375F and coat a donut pan with any oil you have.
• Mix all the dry ingredients (flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking powder, and salt) into a bowl. Set it aside for now.
• Mix all the wet ingredients (coconut oil, almond milk, apple sauce, and vanilla extract). Pour this into the dry mixture, and give it a good mix without over-mixing. 
• Pipette them into the donut pan. You can use cut out zip lock bag, or if you're lazy like me just spoon them in there really carefully. Haha.
• Now they're ready to go in the oven. Bake for about 10-15 minutes depending on your oven. The donuts are done when they have crusty edges.
• Let's make the "glaze". Add all the ingredients together. Use almond milk to determine the consistency that you want. I put quotation mark around "glaze" because almond milk makes it runnier and the mixture is not as "glazy" as when I melt chocolate chips. Anyways, I added sugar little by little as I tasted the mixture so I don't make it overly sweet. 
• When the donuts are out of the oven and cooled, drizzle the chocolate topping or dip the whole donuts into the topping. Sprinkle them with whatever that you like. As you can see from the pictures, I used coconut shreds and almond chips.

Tada! And they're done! Delicious and healthier donut to kick start your day!

One thing I have to add is that they were a bit dry. I am not a baking expert, but maybe it's because I used coconut oil instead of vegan butter that I normally use? Maybe you can help me. How do you make moist and fluffy vegan bakes? Let me know!

Recipe: Crispy Sweet and Spicy Tofu

This delicious tofu recipe will change the way you view tofu forever! They are so simple to make but full of sweet and spicy flavor. You will love these especilly if you like spicy and/or Korean food!

You will need:

• 1 firm (or extra firm) tofu
• ¼ of a chopped onion
• 3 chopped small cloves of garlic
• 1 tablespoonful of ketchup
• 1 tablespoonful of gochujang (Korean chili paste)
• 3 tablespoonfuls of soy sauce
• 1 tablespoonful of agave nectar (or brown sugar)
• 2 tablespoonfuls of potato starch (or flour)
• 1 tablespoonful of sesame oil
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Water

First things first, let’s prepare the tofu. Chop tofu into cubes, however big you would like. Then, mix the tofu, potato starch, and some salt in a clean plastic bag. Fry the tofu on an oiled pan in a low to medium heat. It should look something like this:

Cook them on all sides to make them crispy all around. When they’re cooked to your liking, go ahead and remove them from heat. I like to keep them on a paper towel to drain some oil. Let’s have a closer look, since these are fried to its perfection. ;)

Use the same pan and add the chopped onions and garlic. Feel free to other vegetables like carrots and green bell peppers to enhance the taste. When the onions are soft, it’s time to make the sauce. Add soy sauce, ketchup, gochujang, agave nectar, and 2 tablespoonfuls of water. You can decide how spicy you want this to be; you can always substitute gochujang with ketchup.

After they cook for awhile, add some more water (about 4-5 tablespoonfuls) and add the sesame oil. You can add some peppers to enhance the taste. Reduce the sauce until it looks something like this:

Now you’re ready to mix in the tofu! And then... yes you guessed it! Time to eat this delicious dish!