Tiffany Raiford
The thing about cupcakes is that they’re little tiny cakes; that makes them amazing. The other thing about cupcakes is that they are tiny little bites of heaven, and they’re not even remotely difficult to make. You can make a cupcake recipes from scratch (we will teach you how to do that right here in both a chocolate and a vanilla version) or you can use a box of cake mix (we highly recommend the ones with the little sprinkles called Funfetti – and always go with the egg white version of the recipe since it is far superior) and do what you will. You don’t need ample time in which to make cupcakes, and no one is ever going to know the difference between your own recipe and one you borrowed from a box – so you can cheat this all you want. The nice thing about cupcakes, too, is that kids love them. This means you can spend ample time in the kitchen bonding with your kids over a cupcake recipe. It’s a pretty win-win situation in our opinion, and we love the idea of getting them to do something fun and delicious. Sure, there are those that don’t allow their kids to eat cupcakes and those who cannot eat this particular food for dietary or health reasons, but you can always adapt these recipes to control any dietary or health concerns you or your children might have (your doctor or dietician likely has some excellent advice on precisely how to go about doing this).
What we’ve done is come up with a few amazing different cupcake recipes for you and your kids to enjoy on a rainy day, a fun weekend or any other time you just want to indulge your sweet tooth. The recipes are very easily adapted, and each one can be changed. Some aren’t recipes so much as ideas you can incorporate into your favorite recipe (or cake mix), which is what makes these recipes so creative and delicious.
Traditional Homemade Cupcake Recipe – Vanilla
1 ¼ cup flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
Salt to taste
2 eggs
¾ cup sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract
½ cup canola oil
½ cup butter milk
Mix all your liquid ingredients with a blender and then add your dry ingredients together while continuing to mix the batter on a medium setting until everything is perfectly mixed. You’ll fill your cupcake wrappers about 2/3 full and then bake your masterpiece at 350 degrees for 15 minutes – cool and decorate.
Traditional Homemade Cupcake Recipe – Chocolate
½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
¾ cup flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
Salt to taste
2 eggs
½ cup sugar
½ cup brown sugar
1/3 cup vegetable oil
2 tsp vanilla
½ cup buttermilk
Mix all your dry ingredients together in a small bowl. Take all your liquid ingredients and mix them with a mixer, adding your dry ingredients when you get all the liquid ingredients well blended. Fill your cupcake wrappers 2/3 of the way and then baking your cupcakes for 18 minutes at 350 degrees.
Rainbow Cupcakes
This is a simple adaptation. What you will do here is simply take your favorite vanilla cupcake recipe and separate your batter into three or four bowls, add a few drops of your favorite food coloring to each bowl to make different colors and then layer them into the cupcake wrappers. When you bite into the finished product, you’ll have different layers of color and it’s always fun for kids to enjoy!
Chocolate Kiss Cupcakes
One of my kids’ favorite ways to eat their favorite cupcakes is with a Hershey Kiss in the center. We simply place a kiss in the center of the batter and push it in until it’s no longer visible when we place it in the oven and let them bake as is, decorate them and then eat. It’s good and delicious.
Peanut Butter Cup Cupcakes
There is nothing more flavorful than a cupcake with a Reese’s Peanut Butter cup pushed down inside before it bakes. It’s simple; just push the cup into the batter and then bake it as you are supposed to do according to the instructions and enjoy. It’s delicious and fun.
Snake Cupcakes
My kids love this one on Halloween. What we do is make our favorite cupcakes and then dye frosting green. We frost them all, and then we place them in a swiveling line so that they touch and form the shape of a creepy, crawling snake. We give the ‘snake’ M&M eyes and a red licorice tongue and everyone is happy to see a snake for the first – and only – time in their lives.
Ice Cream Cone Cupcakes
This is a fun one, too. We like to take our cupcakes and remove them from the wrapper when they’re completely cool and before we decorate the top. We then shove them down inside an ice cream cone so that just the top of each one is visible. We put white frosting on top so that it looks like an ice cream cone. We sprinkle some sprinkles on top and suddenly you have a fun ice cream cone cupcake dessert that everyone adores.
Easter Baskets
Another holiday favorite for my kids is the Easter basket cupcake. We have these made with regular cupcakes. We then add a piece of colored licorice to the top, twisting it so that it appears like a handle. From there we just place little jelly beans and candy eggs on the white frosting and it transforms the entire recipe into an adorable little Easter basket that’s entirely edible.
All Boy Cupcakes
We have three girls and a boy. Now, our boy and our youngest girl are twins and they just turned one. So while we haven’t gotten to make this recipe for them just yet, we do make it for our nephews and they love it; it’s perfect for a sweet little guy who loves dirt and bugs. We use chocolate cupcakes for this, cover them with chocolate icing and then we sprinkle some crushed up Oreos on top and place some gummy worms on the top of those and you suddenly have a dirty mess of cupcake and bugs. Boys love this one.
All Girl Cupcakes
When our girls want to make cupcakes, they want pink and glittery and princess-like creations that they can do on their own. We dye the frosting pink, give them pink crystal sprinkles and we let them take the little rose and flower décor premade and prepackaged to go on cakes to place on top. We also like to give them the sprinkles that look like little pearls. They particularly love those as it gives their cupcakes a very regal look.
Photo by Charley Gallay/Getty Images for SW
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