Week 42 - Microwave

I make a lot of food in the microwave, so for the microwave challenge, I tried to think of something I hadn't made before that could be fully made in the microwave. I kept seeing mug cakes on Instagram, and somehow still hadn't made one, so that was perfect for this challenge. I pulled up a recipe for a vegan snickerdoodle mug cake from A Virtual Vegan, and hoped for the best!

Since I didn't know how the ingredients would respond to an attempt to bake in the microwave, I tried to stick closely to the recipe with only minor modifications. The ingredients I used were:

- 1.5 tbsp mixed nut butter ($0.37)

- just under 1 tsp vanilla extract ($0.05)

- 4 tbsp vanilla soy milk ($0.07)

- 3 tbsp sugar ($0.18)

- 6 tbsp all purpose flour ($0.07)

- about 1/4 tsp baking soda ($0.02)

- pinch of salt ($0.02)

- 1 tsp or so of ground cinnamon, divided ($0.08)

Not all of the measurements were exact. Some, like the cinnamon, I just added without measuring because it didn't matter if we had a little more, and others we couldn't be as precise because our teaspoons didn't go by quarters at the time. This mug cake snack cost about $0.86, which was great for a snack, and I was happy to see the low cost since a single serving cake really shouldn't cost very much.

Putting together the mug cake was relatively easy. The first step was to mix up the nut butter, vanilla extract, milk, and sugar, making sure to break up the nut butter as much as possible. Then everything else got added into the mug and stirred together. (Most of the cinnamon went into the cake, with just a little bit kept for sprinkling on top.) The instructions said to not over-mix, and to just stir until there was no more dry flour, but that took me a while.

The mug went into the microwave uncovered, and I took the recommendation to put it on a small plate in case of overflow. (It didn't even reach the top, so I guess I didn't need to worry.) It's been many months since I made this (so behind on challenge posts that it was still a few months later when I wrote the initial draft), but I think I cooked it in the microwave for about 60-75 seconds. It's ready when it's fluffy and puffed up, so I might have microwaved it a little too long since it didn't puff up as much as I was expecting it to and I kept trying to see if it would rise more. A little sprinkle of cinnamon on top, and it was done!

This was a fun afternoon experiment, and I could definitely see myself making a mug cake again. Often, I'll just get a craving for cookies or brownies or cake, and it's too late or too much effort to make one from scratch, so a single-serving mug cake would be perfect for those situations. Thankful for easy microwave snacks!