"Vegan" Steampunk Cupcakes (or, how to veganize anything with 5 minutes of Google-fu)

I've already expressed my undying love for cupcakes in this blog, but I haven't yet expressed my admiration for all things steampunk. No, I'm not just now jumping on the bandwagon; I've enjoyed steampunk stuff since before it had a name. *grin* So, imagine my jubilation when I saw a post labeled "Vegan Steampunk Cupcakes"! Now, in all fairness, I first read about this blog post from the Cupcakes Take The Cake feed, and they titled it "Steampunk vegan chocolate cupcakes with top hats, goggles, gears and Tootsie Roll modeling chocolate". When I clicked through to the original post on Bakingdom, it was titled "Tootsie Roll Modeling Chocolate on Steampunk Cupcakes". Now, as I was pretty sure, and as the author confirmed, Tootsie Rolls are *not* vegan. The author posts her recipe for the cupcakes and frosting here, and not only is it vegan, but it looks pretty darn tasty. I decided that the steampunk cupcakes were simply too cool to just pass up, so I Googled "vegan Tootsie Rolls" and came up with this recipe (originally came from baking911.com) -

Vegan Tootsie Roll

Ingredients:

1 pound (16 ounces) of any good dark chocolate
2/3 cup light corn syrup
1 cookie sheet or jelly roll pan covered with plastic wrap


Instructions:

1. Finely chop chocolate and place in a clean, dry bowl.

2. Place bowl over a pan of water that has been brought to a boil and removed from heat. Stir chocolate to melt evenly. Remove bowl from the surface of the water and stir to cool slightly.

3. Stir in corn syrup thoroughly and scrape the paste from the bowl. Allow the paste to cool and harden(overnight is best).

4. Squeeze fat from plastic on paper towels before kneading.

5. Lightly dust work surface and chocolate with sifted cocoa powder. Divide the batch into small bite size peices and wrap with plastic wrap or however you want.

NOTE: Use gloves when kneading and working with the chocolate dough.


I'm not sure exactly when I'll have time to try *truly* veganizing these awesome cupcakes, but I plan on it being sooner rather than later!