I believe that you always need to have a ‘go to’ recipe or two in your pocket for when guests drop in. These simple vanilla cupcakes are just that – simple, but oh so delicious and light! This recipe should be your go to recipe for the perfect cupcakes – with even, flat-ish tops, prefect for icing!
Get out your half a cup measuring unit and you’re underway – heck, you don’t really need to measure out the vanilla bean paste… a little more, a little less, you’ll still end up with the same result. It’s all about creaming the butter and sugar and getting as much air as you can into the mixture.
I made a traditional butter icing for my cupcakes. Simple as creaming 1/2 cup softened butter with 1 cup icing sugar and 1 tablespoon buttermilk. Depending on the softness of your butter and if you choose to add a little food colouring (we did blue for some ‘Geelong Cats Finals Cupcakes’ – shame they weren’t navy) you may need to add a little extra icing sugar until you get the desired consistency.
SIMPLE VANILLA CUPCAKES
1/2 cup softened butter
1 cup caster sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla paste
3 eggs
1 cup buttermilk
2 cups self raising flour
Preheat your oven to 180 degrees and place pattie pans into your cupcake tin, ready to be filled.
Cream the butter, sugar and vanilla paste for a minimum of five minutes – you want it to almost go white. Slowly add the eggs into the mixture, one at a time. Then add the buttermilk and the flour, alternating between half a cup of buttermilk and half a cup of flour.
Spoon into the pattie pans and then bake for 15 – 20 minutes, when a skewer should come out clean.
Allow to cool before icing (if you choose to ice).
