Flourless Chocolate Cupcakes with Salted Chocolate Ganache

Sometimes a guy just needs a cupcake.
I don’t care if cupcakes are considered the height of femininity. If they are manly as a bag full of rainbows. With all their beautiful decorations, dainty, sparkly, tiny, fierce, and fabulous — hours spent to get each exactly right even knowing that they will be eaten in a couple of bites. I don’t care if cupcakes are “ars gratia artis” [see David? I know my latin!] which can be translated — in the syntax MGM employed — as “art for the sake of art”.
Sometimes a guy needs a cupcake, and there’s nothing you can do about it.

The internet loves cupcakes.
Recipes, photos, videos, they’re all there.
Each holiday deserves (and has) its own special cupcake.
Every now and then, an article comes out about “the death of the cupcakes” (seriously just google “cupcake craze” or “cupcake trend”, I dare you.)
This has been happening for some 10 years at least now. Yet cupcakes are still among us.
With such staying power, cupcake philosophers are forced to debate whether cupcakes are a trend, a craze, or a staple of desserts the world. I think the latter is the right answer.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not here to extol the virtues of cupcakes.
I don’t love cupcakes that much.
Now that I’m thinking about it, I don’t think I have ever bought a cupcake for myself in the past what, 8 years?
Sure, I go to Two Little Red Hens or The Little Cupcake Bakeshop when niece wants a treat (who am I to deny her that?)
But it never crosses my mind to buy a cupcake.

So all I am trying to say here is that even a guy who doesn’t like cupcakes sometimes needs a cupcake, and that might occur for the most random reasons.
When that happens, it’s important to have in your recipe arsenal a solid cupcake recipe.
Solid as in very good, very easy, and very healthy (if there’s such a thing as a healthy cupcake.)
And that is what these Flourless Chocolate Cupcakes with Salted Chocolate Ganache are all about.

Your average flourless chocolate cake tends to be fudgy and dense, I know that for a fact. These cupcakes are instead lighter and kind-of-fluffy.
They have that intense chocolate flavour for true chocolate lovers. And I love chocolate like some people love bagels.
One last note, I used ganache instead of buttercream on these cupcakes because I think that’s more my style but do as you like, I won’t judge you.

Flourless Chocolate Cupcakes with Salted Chocolate Ganache                            Print this recipe! 

Ingredients
Makes 12 cupcakes

Cupcakes

1 ½ tablespoons coconut oil(or butter), plus more for the cake pan
3 oz / 85 gr +70% dark chocolate, chopped
3 large free-range organic eggs, separated
½ cup / 2.7 oz / 75 gr raw coconut palm sugar, divided*
1 tablespoons instant-espresso powder**
pinch of fine grain sea salt
½ tablespoon pure vanilla extract

*use regular brown sugar if you don’t care about paleo thing
** the espresso powder gives the cupcakes a more powerful chocolate taste, but also adds a mochy flavor. If you don’t care about it, replace it with cocoa powder.

Chocolate ganache

¼ cup almond milk (or any milk of your choice
½ tablespoon coconut oil
3.5 oz / 100 gr dark chocolate, roughly chopped
Fleur de sel or fine sea salt, for sprinkling

Directions

Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C), place a rack in the middle.
Grease a standard 12-cup muffin tin and line with muffin cups. Set aside.
Place coconut oil (or butter) and chopped chocolate in a medium sized heatproof bowl. Place the bowl over a pot of simmering water (making sure that the bottom of the bowl does not touch the water). Stir until the chocolate has completely melted.
Remove the bowl from over the boiling water, let mixture sit for a few minutes.
In a medium bowl beat together egg yolks and ¼ cup of sugar with a mixer on medium-high speed until thick and the sugar has completely dissolved.
Add espresso powder and salt; beat until combined, about 1 minute. Add vanilla and melted-chocolate mixture; beat 1 more minute.
In another large bowl, beat egg whites and a pinch of salt on medium-high speed until foamy.
Increase speed to high and gradually add remaining ¼ cup of sugar, beating until stiff peaks form, about 5 minutes.
With the help of a spatula, gently fold egg whites into chocolate mixture in 3 batches.
Divide batter evenly between muffins cups.
Bake for 20 minutes until set.
Let cupcakes cool completely in the muffin tin on a wire rack. As they cool the cupcakes will sink in the middle, that’s okay.
To make the ganache bring the milk and coconut oil to a boil in a small sauce pan. Put the chopped chocolate in a small bowl and pour the hot rice milk over it. Stir until the ganache is smooth and velvety. Let cool for at least 15 minutes.
While the ganache is still warm, spoon it over the top of each cupcake. While the ganache is still wet, sprinkle with fleur de sel.
Let cupcakes sit a few moments to set, though ganache will not harden completely.

Nutrition facts

One cupcake yields 147 calories, 10 grams of fat, 11 grams of carbs, and 3 grams of protein.