First Time Vegan Cupcakes (with pineapple flower)

So, for awhile now I have been craving cupcakes, hard. I wanted to make them ethically and properly so I began searching for a delicious recipe that I could use in order to satisfy my craving.

I ended up using a standard chocolate cake recipe and substituted everything with their vegan alternatives. This was the first time I have ever used egg substitute powder and I found that the cupcakes ended up being a little bit more crumbly but still delicious!

Cupcake recipe:
2 cups all purpose flour
2 cups sugar
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup vegan shortening
3/4 cup water
equivalent of 2 eggs (using the replacer)
3/4 cup almond milk
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup vegan chocolate

Bake for about 20 mins at 350 degrees, but keep an eye on them.

Then I turned down the oven to 200 degrees and sliced pineapple as thin as I could and put them into cupcake forms and threw them in the oven expecting them to dry up nicely in an hour or so. Boy was I wrong, four hours later I was finally sick of waiting and luckily they were done enough and I pulled them out!
*Tip: grease the cupcake molds a little bit, the pineapple sticks!

Icing recipe:
1 1/2 cups of icing sugar
2 tablespoons of vanilla almond milk (or you could use soy)
1/4 cup vegan butter (softened)
1 tsp vanilla

The cupcakes were cool when I iced them (obviously, since pineapples take 4 hours to dry!) Then I just placed the pineapple flower right on top.

I couldn't have been more pleased, and my roommates weren't opposed either!

 Be well!