Recipe: Raw Vegan Chocolate Cupcakes
- Words by Peppermint
Yum! If you’ve still got room for a couple more deliciously decadent treats this season, take a look at Maz Pugoy’s recipe for nutrient rich, raw cupcakes, as featured in Issue 22 of Peppermint.
These mini cupcakes are a crowd pleaser and come in perfect little portions. You can enjoy them completely guilt-free, because there are no filler ingredients or nasty additives – just organic, plant-based, nutrient dense wholefoods. Enjoy!
This recipe makes 24 mini cupcakes – depending on the mould you use it may yield less or more.
Ingredients – cake mix
1 cup walnuts
1 cup almonds
1 cup finely desiccated coconut
2 cups medjool dates
2 tbs coconut oil
4 tbs coconut nectar
1 cup diced zucchini
3/4 cup cacao powder
1 tsp vanilla powder
Ingredients – frosting
3 cups chopped avocado
1/4 cup raw cacao
2 tbs coconut oil
1/4 cup coconut nectar
1 tsp vanilla powder
2 tbs cacao butter liquefied
Method
Combine all ingredients for the cake mix in a food processor, until the mixture binds to itself when you pinch it together. Press the dough into mini cupcake tins lined with plastic wrap or silicone mini cupcake moulds. Pop out each cupcake and arrange on a wire rack or platter ready for frosting.
Mix all ingredients for the frosting in a high-powered blender until well combined, then spoon into a piping bag or a zip lock bag with one corner snipped off, and pipe onto the mini cupcakes. Decorate with edible flowers, superfoods – whatever you like. I used desiccated coconut that has been dyed with beet juice.
WORDS AND RECIPE: MAZ PUGOY
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- Bec Bligh
Quick show of hands: who’s opened a water bottle expecting a refreshing sip… and instead been greeted by the unmistakable whiff of uh-oh?
Because for something that follows us everywhere (desk, car, hikes, yoga…), the humble drink bottle is strangely prone to becoming a science experiment. Hard-to-clean corners and gaskets. Mystery smells. Bec Bligh and her husband Tim know it well. A six-month sailing trip along the Queensland coast left them with a lifetime of memories and one stubborn annoyance: mouldy water bottles they couldn’t properly clean.
So they did something about it.
Enter @EverVessel. Thoughtfully designed borosilicate glass and stainless steel bottles that keep things beautifully simple: durable materials, wide openings, easy-to-clean parts and none of the techy gimmicks that tend to age badly. Turns out simplicity, done well, is pretty powerful stuff. (Their many design awards agree!)
And lately they’ve added a little extra delight: the Artist Series, where creatives like Paola Castro, Ben Miners and Martin Thompson transform these everyday companions into tiny travelling artworks. There are more colabs in the works, too: hydration, but make it joyful! 🎨💧
We chatted with Bec about the sailing trip that started it all, the philosophy behind Ever Vessel, and why the most sustainable product is often just the one you keep using.
Tap the link in our bio to read the full conversation. 🚰
#EverVessel #ReusableWaterBottle
Pull up a chair… there’s room at this table!
For the first time, Feast for Freedom is bringing people together for a spectacular long-table dinner as part of the Melbourne Food & Wine Festival.
A Longer Table is exactly what it sounds like: one beautiful shared table inside the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre (@Asrc1), piled with generous dishes inspired by this year’s hero cooks, Noha and Nige.
From 6 to 9pm on Wednesday, 25 March, this is what you can expect:
🍽 A three-course shared feast
🍷 Matched drinks
🎶 Live entertainment
✨ A room full of good humans
Your ticket doesn’t just buy you a delicious dinner. It supports the ASRC’s vital work and helps create a fairer future for people seeking asylum.
Seats are limited, and long tables have a way of filling up quickly – head to @MelbFoodAndWine’s website to book now: feastforfreedom.org.au/mfwf
#FeastForFreedom #MelbourneFoodAndWineFestival #LongTableDinner #FoodForChange
Sew versatile! 🪡
Another great make from Lisa from @SunnySewsEveryday:
My #PeppermintWaratahWrapDress is finished and I’m so proud of it. It has been designed not to flap open and flash your pants in the wind, so I feel confident it will be a great wheelchair or standing dress in English weather.
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Sun-safe chic is always in style. ☀️
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For our fabrics we chose two from our lovely sewing partner @Karmme_Apparel – the bold Rottnest Stripes in a lightweight, soft-drape cotton, and the quality linen in the handpainted Mexico Collection.
Get making the Myrtle – the only question is, can you stop at just one?
Link in bio 🪡
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Location: @ShareTheDignityAustralia
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It’s time to Feast!
Some recipes travel a long way before they land on your table to delight your taste buds. This year’s Feast for Freedom invites us to gather our friends, cook something delectable and raise funds for the incredible work of the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre (@Asrc1) while we’re at it.
The 2026 Feast features recipes shared by two remarkable cooks: Noha, who brought the flavours of Palestine with her when she arrived in Australia, and Nige, a Sri-Lankan Tamil cook whose journey with food began in the most unexpected of places.
You can host your own Feast up until 30 April – simply register online and get planning! Host a dinner, organise a workplace lunch, or gather your community… However you do it, the idea is simple: cook, connect and celebrate the cultures and stories that shape Australia.
Want to find out more? Head to the link in bio to meet Noha and Nige, learn more about their stories, and discover a delicious recipe to try.
#FeastForFreedom #PeppermintMagazine #FoodForGood #ASRC
