Fuel, Garbage, & Cupcakes

My dad built this. In Greece, from some books he checked out at the library. Which is pretty cool, considering he was a restaurant owner by trade, not a welder/inventor. Crazy contraption, but it could be our future, no? One per household? I guess we’re all set for alternative fuel, though I’m not sure about shipping this thing over here. Lucky for us daddio has plans for Rob to begin building some of these, here in our back yard. So you know who to call when your tank is on E.

Our first snow in Durham. Something about the garbage piling around our street all covered, like cupcakes under frosting, so nice. Syba likes to smell the white stuff; she’s kind of a party dog so maybe it reminds her of something else, I don’t know.

So these cupcakes were made with the same recipe (see Vasilopita) minus the coin insertion. Due to their cute small size, they only need to be baked for 20 minutes. Also – for half of the batter I added about 2 T of cocoa powder and 1 T soy milk to the mix, producing the chocolate variety seen here.

The frosting:
2 sticks Earth Balance shortening
1 stick Earth Balance spread
about a bag or box of confectioners’ sugar
1 t vanilla OR ½ t almond extract and 2 T cocoa powder