It’s been a while since I posted a cupcake recipe, and I made these for a Strongwoman’s birthday a few months back. I’ve been slow at getting recipes out, but oh well. Hopefully you’ll stick with me through it all.

I adapted this recipe from Life, Love and Sugar. You can find her recipe here.

The use of whipped egg whites in this recipe adds to the airiness of the cupcake, and keeps them light. But this recipe is a big punch of sugar, so if you aren’t a huge fan of sweet, or overly-sweet, things, then you could use a different flavoured buttercream or frosting.

You don’t have to colour the frosting either, if you don’t want to. I just thought it paired well with the sprinkle cupcakes. You could pipe vanilla frosting on top and decorate with remaining sprinkles if you would prefer.

The great thing about these cupcakes is that they bake flat, so they’re easy to decorate. They don’t rise as much as muffin recipes, or even some other cupcake recipes, tend to do. Clearly I didn’t fill each of my cupcake liners equally, hence why some are a bit shorter than others.

And now I’ll leave you with a few photos of the cupcakes before finding the recipe below.

Ingredients

100g plain flour
60g cake flour (or use plain flour)
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
2 large eggs, at room temperature, divided
85g unsalted butter, at room temperature
150g caster sugar
1 tbsp vegetable or coconut oil
1 1/2 tsp vanilla bean paste or extract
150ml milk (skim or whole, both work)
1/3 cup (approx. 90g) rainbow sprinkles/jimmies
1 portion vanilla buttercream frosting
food colouring of choice

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C. Line a muffin tray with cupcake liners.
2. In a medium bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.
3. In the bowl of a standing mixer, or in a large bowl with a handheld whisk, beat together the butter and sugar for 2 minutes. Add the oil and vanilla to the bowl and continue beating until light and fluffy. Keep beating until the mixture changes in colour from a pale brown to a much lighter colour.
4. Add the egg yolks one at a time, fully incorporating the first yolk before adding the second. Remember to scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed.
5. Add a third of the flour mixture, and whisk until just combined, then add half of the milk and continue beating. Add another third of the flour, continue to mix until almost combined, before adding the rest of the milk. Add the final third of the flour ingredients, and mix until just incorporated. Set aside.
6. Add the egg whites to a large clean bowl. Using a clean whisk, or clean beaters, whisk the egg whites until they form soft peaks. This will take a few minutes, but keep at it.
7. Add half of the egg whites to the cake batter, folding it in carefully using a spatula or wooden spoon so as to not deflate all of the air. Do this until almost fully incorporated.
8. Add the remaining egg whiles and the sprinkles. Fold through the batter until combined fully. Do this slowly and gently.
9. Fill each cupcake liner about 3/4 full. Bake for 18 – 20 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean when inserted into the centre of the cakes. The cakes should bounce back when touched gently.
10. Remove the cupcakes from the oven and allow to cool in the tray, on top of a cooling rack. After about 20 minutes, cupcakes can be removed from the muffin tray and transferred directly to the wire rack until completely cool.
11. Divide your frosting into separate bowls. I used four colours, so I separated mine into four bowl. Add food colouring to each of the bowls and mix well.
12. You can either add each colour frosting to a different piping bag, and then pipe it in lines onto a layer of cling film before rolling it up and adding it to a larger piping bag (see this video) or, you can carefully spoon each colour of buttercream into alternating lines onto a piece of clingfilm, then roll up and add to a piping bag.
13. Once the cupcakes are completely cool, pipe the frosting on top. Then dig in!