Recipes have been adapted with permission from Sweet Vegan Treats by Hannah Kaminsky. For more delicious vegan desserts, you can purchase her book on Amazon.

Paging through a Christmas kitchenware catalog during the holiday season, one recipe in particular caught my eye: eggnog bread. As one might expect from a mainstream publication at that time, the dense loaf was saturated with mind-boggling measures of eggs, milk, butter, and of course eggnog. Converting this into an unlikely vegan variant was a challenge I simply could not turn down!

Directions

1. Preheat your oven to 350ºF and line two dozen muffin tins with cupcake papers.

2. In your stand mixer, cream the butter with the sugar, nutmeg, vanilla, and black salt. While the mixer churns, blend the flaxseeds with the water, allowing them to sit and slightly gel. Introduce the flax mixture into the bowl of the stand mixer and stir to combine. The batter will be somewhat lumpy at this point, but as long as you don’t have any obscenely large clumps of solid butter, it should be fine.

3. In a separate bowl, combine your flour, baking powder, and baking soda. Slowly add these dry ingredients to the contents of the bowl waiting in your stand mixer, alternating with the eggnog until both are used up. Fully incorporate each addition but be careful not to over mix.

4. Pour the resulting batter into your prepared cupcake liners about ⅔ to ¾ of the way full and bake for 20 to 22 minutes. The cupcakes should not appear particularly browned; keep a close eye on them.

5. For the glaze, place the butter and brown sugar in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Stir until the butter melts and the sugar dissolves, creating a smooth syrup. Add the eggnog, rum, and salt, and bring the mixture to a gentle boil. Remove from the heat. Slowly introduce the confectioner’s sugar, whisking vigorously into the mixture until the glaze thickens and loses a little of its shine; 1 to 2 minutes. Pour or spoon a dollop on top of each cupcake. Garnish with sliced almonds, lavishing your little cakes with as much of the nuts as desired.