Lava Java Chocolate Coffee Cupcake Doughnuts

These cupcakes with a kick have a sunken chocolate centre, crowned with a thin crispy shell that gives way to a moist and gooey hole of deliciousness. Ohhhhhh man, that's good.

Makes: 12 cupcakes

Time: 1 hour

Inspired by Spacegirl Melissa, I've been stirring up a vegan massacre of cupcakes as my first foray into baking. Among the original recipes one favourite is my Coconut Kiwi and Lavender cupcakes! And there's more where that came from:

1. Coconut, Kiwi and Lavender Cupcakes
2. Thai Cupcakes with Coconut, Lemongrass and Kaffir Lime Leaf
3. Chai Tea Cupcakes

Super Easy Lava Java Chocolate Coffee Cupcake Doughnuts 

Ingredients

• 1½ cups organic white flour
• 1⅓ tablespoons instant coffee ground
• 4 tablespoons cocoa powder
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon of baking soda
• 1 teaspoon of salt

• ⅓ cup vegetable oil
• 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup cold brewed coffee

• 1 cup white sugar
• ½ cup premium chocolate cocoa powder

Directions

The Cake Batter

Brew a pot of extra strong coffee and store in the fridge so that it's cold when you're ready to bake. This can be done up to a day in advance, however coffee become bitter, so freshest is best. Brew it fresh, and put it in the freezer to chill quickly 30 minutes before baking. You want cold liquid.

Add all of the dry ingredients to your mixing bowl, mix well busting up clumps or lumps.

Push the dry ingredients to the edges of the bowl creating a small pit in the centre to add the wet ingredients in.

Using a spatula gently push the dry ingredients into the pool of wet ingredients, and mix gently.

Spoon the batter into 12 medium sized cupcake papers, sprayed with a very small amount of cooking oil. They work fine straight in the tray, but you'll need to use extra grease to ensure they don't stick.

In The Raw, Just Before Things Get Hot

The Lava

Warm up a sauce pan on low-medium and add white sugar and cocoa powder, plus a table spoon of water. Careful the pan is not too hot, we want this to go slow and controlled.

Do not leave the lava unattended, we only want to melt the sugar a little bit, just enough so it blends with the cocoa and everything gets wet.

Wait for the sugar to melt just a little, then stir it all so the melting sugar becomes a chocolaty sauce. If the dry cocoa powder doesn't mix completely, add another 1/2 tablespoon of water. Take it off the heat right away, over cooking will cause the lava to harden.

Spoon the lava onto the middle of the top of each cupcake, trying not to let it run off onto the sides. The lava is heavy and will create a pit of deliciousness inside the cupcake after baking.

Optional: After baking, fill your gooey pit with something delicious, like caramel. Oh man!

The Heat

Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit (°F) for 20 minutes. We want to slightly under-cook these cupcakes, but still have fully baked cake. Use a knife to see if it comes out clean, and continue baking in 1-minute intervals until it's done. Remember, there's lava in the middle, so the knife might have the chocolate on it from the lava in the centre.

Let your cupcakes cool completely, being very careful not to disturb the delicate thin crispy top. When you remove the cupcakes from the tray they will be very delicate because of our under-cooking, be careful and try to keep the thin crispy top in-tact.

Biting into these beauties will reveal a combination of textures from the thin crispy chocolate top to the moist gooey hole in the centre. Yumm!

Tips

• Just mix until the dry ingredients are wet, over mixing makes dense glutinous cupcakes. When first combining the ingredients, instead of mashing it all together just roughly move it around with your fingers, then let the batter rest for 20 minutes to allow the wet and dry to combine passively, keeping it light and airy.
• Measurements are exact, don't tightly pack the dry ingredients in your scoop, you can use two scoops, one to scoop into your actual measuring scoop. Use a flat edge to shave off the excess.