As the title of my posts suggests, I’ve been doing lots of baking these past few days.

First, I made a loaf of VeganDad’s Focaccia. I’ve made this a few times before and it always turns out so delicious. A few changes that I make: I add 1 tsp of granulated sugar when the water and yeast gets whisked together; I use dried basil in place of the sage; instead of dividing the loaf in half, I made one big loaf.

Next up, I whipped up a loaf of Oat Bread in my bread machine. Now that I’ve made it several times, I’ve perfected it and so I’ll post it here, just so I always have it.

Oat Bread

(click here for a printer-friendly version)

1 1/4 cups water

2 tablespoons margarine

1 teaspoon salt

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 cup whole wheat flour

1/2 cup rolled oats

2 tablespoons brown sugar

1 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast

Put all ingredients into your bread machine in the order recommended by the manufacturer. Use the medium setting.

Lastly, I made a whole lotta cupcakes for a New Year’s Eve party that we went to. I also made brownies, but they weren’t my best and not really blog-worthy. The cupcakes, on the other hand, were outstanding!

I made:

• Chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream
• Chocolate cake with mocha buttercream topped with chocolate covered espresso bean
• Chocolate cake with vanilla buttercream
• Chocolate cake with mint buttercream and chocolate ganache topped with mint leaves
• Vanilla cake with vanilla buttercream
• Vanilla cake with chocolate buttercream
• Vanilla cake with mocha buttercream topped with chocolate covered espresso bean
• Lemon cake with lemon buttercream topped with candied lemon peel

Yes, it sounds like a lot, but it was actually really easy.  Since I made mini cupcakes, one recipe of chocolate and one recipe of vanilla batter did the trick.  For the lemon cake, I divided the vanilla batter in half and added lemon juice and zest.  For the icings, I made one batch of chocolate and vanilla and divided them in half to make the different flavors. The cake recipes were from The Joy of Vegan Baking; icing recipes were from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World.

The best part is that everyone was raving about how pretty and tasty they were. When they found out they were vegan, the reaction was always “really?!” Haha!