A must have recipe for every baker
When anyone says "cupcake" the first image that comes to mind is a vanilla cupcake with rainbow sprinkles. Am I right? This is the simplest recipe to get your head around and is a ‘must have’ especially for first time bakers. Once you crack this, it is easier to create your own flavour combinations by adapting the recipe. I will show you in future posts how to convert this traditional cake into a variety of tea/biscuit flavoured cakes to add a little tea inspired excitement in your baking. I am all about simplicity and the fewer steps I have to do (and the fewer bowls and spoons I have to wash), the better! So if you want to be a cupcake warrior, the first thing you must master is the basic vanilla cupcake.
To see which brands I like to use for the ingredients please see my ‘Cupcake Basics’ post.
VANILLA CUPCAKES
Makes 12 medium sized cupcakes
Prep: 20 mins (if you are a professional or baking for an emergency)
40 mins (if you are new to baking or just like to relax)
Baking: 16 mins
Serves: 12 people or 1 extremely hungry person.
INGREDIENTS
Cupcakes
60g Unsalted butter, room temperature
160g Caster sugar
2 Eggs, medium sized, room temperature
185g Plain flour OR 150g Plain flour and 35g Corn flour (for a fluffy, lighter texture cake)
1 ½ tsp Baking powder
⅛ tsp Kosher salt
120ml Whole milk, room temperature
1 ½ tsp Vanilla extract
Buttercream
300g Icing sugar, sifted
⅛ tsp Kosher salt
100g Unsalted butter, room temperature
3 tbsp Whole milk, cold OR heavy cream (for a creamier, smoother icing)
1 ½ tsp Vanilla extract
METHOD
Cupcakes
Preheat the oven to 170°C/325°F/Gas Mark 3
Cream the butter and sugar together in a bowl until pale. An electric whisk does the job nicely, or a food mixer on medium speed.
Add one egg into the bowl and mix for one minute. Add the other egg and mix again for another minute.
In a separate dry bowl, mix the flour, corn flour (if you are using it), baking powder and salt together. Sift half of it into the cake mixture and fold until mixed in.
Pour the milk into a cup and add the vanilla. Mix well and slowly add half of the vanilla milk into the cake mixture.
Sift and fold the rest of the flour mixture in, mix well and add the rest of the milk.
Spoon the mixture into the cupcake cases until they are three quarters full. Use a medium ice cream scoop if you have one.
Bake in the oven for 16 minutes, or until golden-brown on top. Poke the cakes with a toothpick which should come out clean. Cool for 5 minutes in the baking tray. Then place on a wire rack until fully cooled.
Buttercream
I highly recommend using an electric whisk or food mixer for this step. It is extremely hard to achieve a light, fluffy buttercream using only a spatula. Unless you want a serious work out, I suggest investing in an electric hand held mixer.
The nice thing about buttercream is you cannot over mix it, therefore the more whisking the better.
Beat the butter until pale and soft. This usually takes a couple of minutes.
Sift the icing sugar into a dry bowl. Take care not to do this step too fast otherwise there will be icing sugar everywhere!
Add the icing sugar and vanilla to the butter and beat slowly until it is all incorporated.
Add the milk or heavy cream and mix in.
At this point, the mixture should be a gloopy yellow consistency. This is when you want to whisk for as long as possible. I recommend around 5 minutes for a really smooth luscious buttercream.
Optional: Add any natural food colouring of your choice.
Spoon the buttercream into a piping bag and add a piping tip of your choice (I like using the Wilton 1M open star tip). Pipe in a swirl motion and sprinkle with hundreds and thousands.
And finally, the easiest step by far. Eat the cupcakes and enjoy!
This may be slightly odd but I like to take the wrapper off, break the cupcake in half sideways and sandwich the icing between the cake. You end up with a mini sandwich cake which, in my opinion, is the perfect way to eat a cupcake. How do you like to eat your cupcakes? And please let me know if you tried this recipe and how it went!
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