A truly perfect Vanilla Cupcake recipe! These Vanilla Cupcakes are easy to make, moist, and bake up beautifully every time! Light, fluffy and flavorful! Got the baking bug? Try my Lemon Cupcakes and Chocolate Cupcakes too!
Perfect Vanilla Cupcakes Recipe
This week I’ve made 6 batches of vanilla cupcakes and a vanilla cake. I feel like my oven has been on for 42 hours straight! =) What are all these cupcakes for, you might ask. Well, for me… and for science, and for you too. Confused yet? I’ll explain…
I have been on a search for a perfect vanilla cupcake recipe for several years. I have tried Martha’s, Magnolia’s, Billy’s and Amy Sedaris’. I’ve read the Cake Bible from cover to cover (really!). I’ve googled until I can’t google anymore! Some of the recipes were good, just not perfect. I’ve considered just giving up… maybe my expectations were to high. I wanted a vanilla cupcake recipe that was as light and fluffy as a box mix, but without all the funny chemicals. I wanted a cupcake that was flavorful and moist. And I wanted it to be almost as easy to make from scratch as from a box.
The BEST Vanilla Cupcakes
This week, I wasn’t going to stop until I found what I was looking for. So I baked and baked… then went to the store for more butter and sugar, and baked some more! I tried recipes with butter, oil, or some of both… recipes with milk, buttermilk, or sour cream… 1 egg, 2 eggs, 5 eggs… baking powder, baking soda… bake at 350*, bake at 325*…
I made cupcakes that were lopsided, over-flowing, over-baked, and just plain ugly…
And then I made these…
They looked beautiful and tasted perfect, so I double checked all my notes to make sure I could remember what I put in them… then I made another batch to make sure it was THE ONE.
They were just as perfect!! I think I heard angels singing….
I am SO happy to share the results of my many experiments! These cupcakes were absolutely delicious and I look forward to making them again and again. Now certainly, peoples tastes and preferences vary greatly. I love these, my husband (my #1 taste tester) loves them, and I hope many of you will too. As with any recipe, it is very important to use the best quality ingredients you can.
Ingredients Needed
You will notice the recipe calls for cake flour, which is a bit more expensive than all-purpose flour, but I have found it is essential to produce the light and fluffy texture I was looking for. Also, the recipe uses oil instead of butter. I realized most cupcake recipes (from scratch) call for butter, and yet box mixes (which have the texture I was looking for) are baked using oil.
I was concerned that using only oil would leave the cupcakes without adequate flavor, but I found that with good quality vanilla, these cupcakes are delicious and flavorful.
- 1 1/4 cups cake flour
- 3/4 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup oil (vegetable, canola or extra light olive oil)
- 1/3 cup milk (whole or low fat, but avoid fat free)
- 1/3 cup sour cream (full fat or light, but avoid fat free)
How To Make Vanilla Cupcakes
- Preheat oven to 350*F.
- In a medium bowl, add cake flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir together with whisk, and set aside.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, add eggs and beat 10-20 seconds. Add sugar and continue to beat on medium speed about 30 seconds. Add vanilla and oil, beat.
- Reduce mixer speed to low and slowly add about half of the flour mixture. Add the milk, then the rest of the flour and the sour cream. Beat until just combined. Scrap down the side of the bowl.
- The batter will be thin. Pour batter into a muffin pan prepared with paper liners. Fill liners about 2/3 full.
- Bake cupcakes in pre-heated oven for 12-14 minutes.
- Cool in pan 1-2 minutes, then remove cupcakes from pan (carefully) and finish cooling on a wire rack.
- Frost as desired when fully cool. I love to use my favorite Vanilla Cream Cheese Frosting recipe.
- Feel free to use this recipe for a cake as well. The recipe above will work for a 6″ cake. Double the recipe for an 8″ or 9″ cake.
* A note about Cake Flour- Cake Flour has a lower protein content than traditional all-purpose flour, which results in a more tender, delicate crumb in the finished product. If you can not find or access cake flour, feel free to substitute as necessary, but your results will vary from the original recipe.
RECIPE UPDATES
I have made this recipe many times with success, but in an effort to always be improving (even great recipes) I’ve made a couple small updates to this recipe (which are now listed in the recipe card).
My original recipe included 1 1/4 tsp. baking powder (now reduced to 3/4), 3/4 cup sugar (now increased to 1 cup) and 1/2 cup buttermilk (now updated to 1/3 cup milk, 1/3 cup sour cream).
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More Cupcake Recipes
How To Make Vanilla Cupcakes
Perfect Vanilla Cupcakes
Ingredients
- 1 1/4 cups cake flour
- 3/4 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup oil vegetable, canola or extra light olive oil
- 1/3 cup milk whole or low fat, but avoid fat free
- 1/3 cup sour cream full fat or light, but avoid fat free
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350*F.
- In a medium bowl, add cake flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir together with whisk, and set aside.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, add eggs and beat 10-20 seconds. Add sugar and continue to beat on medium speed about 30 seconds. Add vanilla and oil, beat.
- Reduce mixer speed to low and slowly add about half of the flour mixture. Add the milk, then the rest of the flour and the sour cream. Beat until just combined. Scrap down the side of the bowl.
- The batter will be thin. Pour batter into a muffin pan prepared with paper liners. Fill liners about 2/3 full.
- Bake cupcakes in pre-heated oven for 12-14 minutes.
- Cool in pan 1-2 minutes, then remove cupcakes from pan (carefully) and finish cooling on a wire rack.
- Frost as desired when fully cool. I love to use my favorite cream cheese frosting or buttercream frosting with these cupcakes.
Delicious! My family and I loved them! Thanks for sharing 🙂
I tried to make this cupcake and yes it was yummy! But I didn’t think it tasted like a cupcake is suppose to taste. To my and my husband’s taste, it tasted like Corn Muffin instead. They came out really good tho!
Hello! Can you give the measurements in grams also ? Or ounces? Please! I think I got the quantities wrong so the cupcakes didn’t turn out perfect at all. 🙁 Thanks a lot!
Hi Ana-Maria, You should be able to find a good conversion chat by searching on google. I only use U.S. standard measurements, so I have no way to convert them for you other than finding a conversion chart. Happy baking!
Hi Glory, Thank you for your reply. i think that your cakes and biscuits are really beautiful. I was truly inspired by them, which is why i went out and bought all the ingredients to try your recipe. thank you.
i am disappointed to see that you deleted my post!!! 🙁 was only trying to be helpful 🙁
This blog is my personal site where I share recipes that I have created, and/or my family loves. If you would like to share your own recipes on your own site, you are welcome to do so. Certainly, individual tastes vary greatly, and what I love may not be for everyone. I do my best to share recipes that I believe will be successful for many people, and I do my best to describe the texture and flavor of the results so that readers can get a good idea of what to expect. I hope that you may find another recipe on my site that is more to your liking.
I have been searching for a vanilla recipe and this one is a keeper. Greatflavor and really moist. I made these using almond extract instead of vanilla to work with my recipe. MANY thanks for a great recipe
Okay, I gave your vanilla cupcake recipe a try. They came out nicely domed, moist and taste very good, the American Buttercream recipe not so much. I think it was just too hot in my kitchen when I made the frosting. So I went to Target and bought some philsbury frosting. I followed your frosting tips and they came out nicely. It was a lot of fun frosting them and my daughter had fun putting sprinkles on them. Thanks for all your hard baking!
Oh my. I always use margarine in making cakes until I ate a boxed cake and I thought to myself, why are they so moist? So I checked the ingredients and I saw they use vegetable oil. I googled cupcakes with oil and wala! However the first time I tried it I didn’t make cupcakes, just a big flat cake. But then I found out the cupcakes are a little tense using the same recipe. I don’t know why. Do you have any amazingly great donut recipes?
I made these cupcakes today and they are perfect and just amazing 🙂 I’m so happy that I found you. I was looking for a perfect cupcake recipe for some time, and here you are.
My rating for this recipe is 100% 😀 I love those <3 Thank you sooooooooo much for sharing this recipe. I can recommend this to anyone. Keep up the good work 🙂 I'm your fan now.
I tried these today and they came out dry and dense. What do you think went wrong?
I might recommend reducing the baking time a bit if the cakes were dry. The texture should be light and springy.