Chocolate Pumpkin Cupcakes

In my post about Socially GF with Kids I talked about chocolate cupcakes that I keep in the freezer just for birthday parties. I gave short directions on how to make them, but I wanted to spend some more talking about them, because these cupcakes are a life saver.

When I first went gluten free, just for me, I read the G-Free Diet by Elisabeth Hasselbeck. In her book she asked a friend of hers that has a gluten free child to give tips on how to do gluten free with kids, because as we know, it's a whole different ball game with kids. This mother told how she always kept cupcakes in the freezer. She had a bag of white cupcakes and bag of chocolate cupcakes. She would call the mother of the birthday kid and find out how the birthday cake was going to be decorated so she could get it decorated to match. This is a fantastic idea. I haven't gone the extra step of decorating the cupcake to match or even have two different kinds in my freezer, but for now my child is young enough that you put chocolate anything in front of her and she's good.

I first started doing this around my daughter's 1st birthday. She wasn't gluten free yet but I was and so were a few friends and family members. I ordered a cake for my daughter's birthday and made these chocolate pumpkin cupcakes for everyone else who couldn't have the gluten full cake. My daughter ended up not liking the cake I bought for her, and asked to have one of the cupcakes I made, she never had either before. She loved my cupcakes over the expensive cake I got just for her. So ever since then I make these cupcakes just for her birthday and keep a stash of them in the freezer for every other occasion. I've brought these cupcakes to birthday parties, baby showers, weddings, graduation parties, baby dedications and any other event requiring cake to be served.

My daughter's Ponyo cupcake cake for her 2nd birthday.

I don't feel too guilt about making and bringing my own cupcakes either. If someone wants to go out the way to provide for us, great! However, that doesn't always happen. We do have a whole bunch of cousins that have the same food allergies as we do so any time there is a wedding or baby dedication on that side of the family they usally provide something or at least gives us a heads up if they will or won't. But not all family members have that kind of foresight.

When I first came up with the idea to mix pumpkin with my cake mix to make pumpkin cupcakes, was at the same time as my daughter's birthday. Her birthday is in the fall and as soon as the leaves change color I buy every can of organic pumpkin I can get my hands on. So since her birthday is in the fall and pumpkin is so fitting during that time of year, I thought why not. If you can use black beans to make brownies and they are healthier, why not pumpkin and cupcakes? So I did and they are fantastic. Now I make them all year round. No one knows and pumpkins are so healthy that I love that extra health kick to an otherwise junk food, plus the pumpkin makes them extra rich. You can really do this with any canned squash that you like. I've used three kinds of cake mix to make these cupcakes and all of them work great. I've used Betty Crocker, Pamela's, and Namaste. I do think Namaste and Pamela's are the richest, but Betty Crocker did pretty well too.

Chocolate Pumpkin Cupcakes
1 box GF cake mix of your choice
15 oz can of pumpkin (make sure it it puree, not pumpkin pie filing) 

Preheat oven according to the box directions.
Mix cake mix and pumpkin together till well combined, do not over mix.  Either spray muffin pan or use paper liners to keep the cupcakes from sticking. I like to spray the top of the muffin pan even when I use liners, just in case they over flow a bit. Use a small ice cream scoop or cookie scoop or tablespoon to fill the pan almost completely full. Bang and shake pan around to make the batter settle and release any air bubbles.  Bake 10-15 minutes longer then what the directions say. They are done when a tooth pick inserted in the center of the largest cupcake comes out fairly clean - just a crumb or two. They are very dense and rich cupcakes so if their is a tiny bitty big of batter still on the toothpick, don't put them back in the oven, they are done. Makes 12 cupcakes.