Everyone loves cupcakes! This is the only vanilla cupcake recipe you will need. They are super easy to make and the texture is light, fluffy, and melt-in-your-mouth good.
Watch the video tutorial below and you will be a pro in no time. We love these with our Cupcake Frosting because a cupcake isn’t a cupcake without frosting.
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Watch Vanilla Cupcakes Video Tutorial!
These cupcakes are perfect for birthday parties and baby showers and they always disappear fast which is why I always make a double batch for gatherings. They are quick and easy to make and homemade cupcakes taste way better than boxed cupcake mix.
Ingredients for Vanilla Cupcakes:
This recipe makes exactly 12 cupcakes and requires simple ingredients: all-purpose flour, butter, sugar, eggs, buttermilk, baking powder, salt and vanilla. The combination of softened butter and buttermilk creates an amazingly soft cupcake crumb that just melts in your mouth. Also, if you haven’t tried our (2-ingredient) Homemade Vanilla Extract, it will take your baked goods to the next level.
How to Make Vanilla Cupcakes:
These cupcakes are easy to master and you will be making bakery-quality cupcakes in no time.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together dry ingredients: flour, baking powder, and salt.
- In a second bowl (or bowl of your stand mixer), beat together softened butter and sugar on medium-high speed 5 minutes until thick and fluffy.
- Beat in eggs 1 at a time, mixing to incorporate with each egg then blend in vanilla and scrape down the bowl.
- Reduce mixer to medium speed and add the flour in thirds, alternating with adding the 1/2 cup buttermilk and beating well between additions.
- Pour batter into 12 lined muffin tins, filling 2/3 full. Bake in the center of the oven at 350˚F for 20-23 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Let cool 5 minutes in the pan then remove cupcakes to a wire rack to cool completely.
Tips for the BEST Cupcakes:
- Room Temperature Ingredients – eggs, buttermilk and butter must be at room temperature to keep your batter an even consistency.
- Alternate Adding Flour and Buttermilk – this keeps the mixture uniform and well blended. If you add in all of the flour or buttermilk at once, it can saturate the creamed butter and cause the mixture to separate. Mix well between each addition.
- Measure Correctly – be sure to use the proper measuring cups for wet and dry ingredients. Watch our video on measuring ingredients to ensure great results every time.
- Don’t Overfill – Fill cupcake liners 2/3 full or they will overflow and cause a muffin top. If you divide evenly between 12 cupcakes, you should have exactly enough batter. A trigger release Ice Cream Scoop makes portioning easier.
How to Decorate Cupcakes:
Once your cupcakes are cooled to room temperature, it’s time to decorate. This is a great vanilla cupcake base for just about any kind of frosting and toppings. We pipe frosting on with a pastry bag and our favorite Wilton 1M Tip. We have so many frosting options so pick your craving:
- Vanilla Cupcake Frosting – our go-to cupcake frosting
- Swiss Meringue Buttercream – well worth the extra effort
- Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting – whipped and decadent
- Blackberry Frosting – you’ll love the flavor and color
Common Questions:
Can I Make Cupcakes Ahead? Once cupcakes are at room temperature, cover and keep at room temperature overnight or refrigerate if storing for longer. After cupcakes are frosted, refrigerate until ready to serve. Cupcakes are great served chilled or at room temperature because they don’t harden with refrigeration.
Can I Use This Batter to Make a Cake? We’ve had great results turning it into a Vanilla Cake. You would need to double the recipe for two 9-inch cake layers.
Can I Substitute the Buttermilk? Plain kefir will also work well instead of buttermilk. You can also make your own buttermilk at a ratio of 1 cup whole milk to 1 Tbsp fresh lemon juice. Combine and let it sit 10 minutes to curdle then stir and use.
How Long to Bake Cupcakes? Bake until the tops are springy and a toothpick inserted int the center comes out clean. These were perfectly baked at 350˚F for 22 minutes in a conventional oven.
More Cupcake Recipes:
Who can resist a cupcake? They’re just so cute and easy to love. We enjoy getting creative with cupcakes and they are one of the easiest desserts to make. These are our top-rated cupcake recipes:
- Moist Chocolate Cupcakes – this is a great base and so easy
- Pumpkin Cupcakes – with a marshmallow-soft frosting
- Honey Cupcakes – with a cherry filling
- Dark Chocolate Cupcakes – with white chocolate frosting
Perfect Vanilla Cupcake Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 1/4 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 2 large eggs, room temperature
- 2 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup buttermilk, or plain kefir, room temperature
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F and line a cupcake/muffin pan with cupcake liners.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together 1 1/4 cups flour, 1 1/4 tsp baking powder, and 1/2 tsp salt. Set flour mix aside.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat butter and sugar on medium-high speed 5 minutes until thick and fluffy, scraping down the bowl as needed.
- Add eggs one at a time, beating well with each addition then scrape down the bowl. Add 2 tsp vanilla and beat to combine.
- Reduce mixer speed to medium and add the flour mixture in thirds alternating with the buttermilk, mixing to incorporate with each addition. Scrape down the bowl as needed and beat until just combined and smooth, and don't overmix. Divide the batter evenly into a 12-count lined muffin or cupcake pan, filling 2/3 full.
- Bake for 20-23 minutes at 350 °F, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Let them cool in the pan for 5 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack and cool to room temperature before frosting.
Nutrition Per Serving
Filed Under
If you make this recipe, I’d love to see pics of your creations on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter! Hashtag them #natashaskitchen
This recipe was first published in June 2012 (below is the original photo). After testing countless batches, we improved the recipe, swapping out oil for softened butter and took out the baking soda to create a super soft crumb. Everyone agrees, these are the best cupcakes. Just read the reviews!
P.S. Thank you all for trying this recipe and sharing it with the people you love.
I tripled the recipe, it made exactly 48 cupcakes but for some reason some of them didn’t fully bake even though I put them 15 minutes at 350F.
Do you know why this happened?
I love this recipe btw it’s the one I use all the time 🙂 thanks a lot
I’m so glad you like the recipe!! I’m not sure why some didn’t fully bake. Have you noticed if your oven fluctuates with heat control with multiple batches when baking?
Since I don’t have an oven I was wondering if I can make this cupcakes in a microwave? Would I have to adjust quantities of any of the ingredients?
Hi Fer, I don’t really do much microwave cooking and have never baked in a microwave so without testing it that way, I have no idea what to even recommend in terms of measurements, cook-times. Sorry I’m not much help with your question.
I live in colorado. Any suggestions on how to make this recipe better for high altitude? More baking powder? Baking soda? Or both
Since I don’t live in a high altitude area, I can’t really say for sure. Sorry I’m not much help with your question. Does anyone else have a good answer for this? Thanks friends!
I am at 3400 ft I always add a 1/4 to a 1/2 cup more flour.
You should always lower the amounts of baking soda/powder when you bake at higher altitudes. Also, decrease the sugar, increase the flour and add a little water. I know, it sounds like a lot of adjustments, but they are necessary to bake at higher altitudes. You can reference the chart on kingarthurflour.com under high attitude baking to give you some guidelines. Most of the time, it will be trial and error. Hope that helps, good luck.
Thank you so much for sharing that!! That’s super helpful!
Thank you!
Thanks for sharing this excellent recipe!
You’re very welcome 🙂 I’m so happy you loved it 🙂
Thanks for the recipe Natasha!
one of the best vanilla cupcakes I ever tried making. These turned out great in regular muffin pans but when I use the small muffin pan with 24 holes they are a bit dry and hard. Can you please help me on that?
Also, I feel the cupcakes are a bit salty. Can we substitute canola oil with butter?
Thanks in advance 🙂
The only thing I can guess for the mini cupcakes (which I haven’t actually tested myself), is that you may be overbaking. I didn’t notice that they were salty but you can cut down on the salt without negatively affecting the recipe. I havent tested these with butter but my experience with using butter instead of oil in cupcakes is they turn out a little tougher, especially after refrigeration. I can’t say for sure since I haven’t tried butter with this particular recipe though.
Hello Natasha
Thank you so much for this perfect recipe. This cup cakes are so fluffy, this is incredible.
I just made 30 vainilla and 30 chocolate
Cupcakes for a kids birthday bash.
For the chocolate ones I added 4 tbs cocoa powder to the egg-sugar- oil mixture just befor adding the flour and buttermilk. They came out perfect.
Gisela, thank you for such a nice review and great job improvising the recipe 😀
Hi Natasha thanks for your reply. Yes I do bake them In the centre of the oven. I did think maybe next time to perhaps but them on the lower shelf to see if that helps. I always use free range eggs…
Every time I make them the tops are very golden in colour. I don’t know why? I think I follow the recipe to a tea! Any ideas on why? I’ve never had them that pale on top?
Hi Laura, did you bake them in the center of your oven, also organic eggs produce a more yellow color to the cupcakes.
Thanks for the recipe Natasha!
Here’s my story. I’ve always liked how cake mixes turn out so fluffy and soft, though I don’t care for the artificial flavour mixes produce.
So, deciding I wanted to make what I’ve always called “white cake” for my girlfriend’s birthday, I blew the dust off my mom’s 1982 Joy of Cooking and made their recipe for white cake. It used butter and lots of whipped egg whites. It tasted OK but the texture was super dense, not what I was trying to do at all.
So I threw my mom’s cherished cookbook straight into the garbage (just kidding) and took to the Internet to find a recipe for Valentine’s cupcakes that would not repeat the same mistakes as the birthday cake. I figured I was putting too much emphasis on “white” and what I wanted was vanilla cake. I googled “fluffy vanilla cupcakes oil” (because I knew I wanted to use oil instead of butter to make it more mix-style.
This is it folks. This is the recipe you want to use for fluffy vanilla cupcakes. This was exactly what I was looking for! I used all purpose flour (but I’m Canadian so maybe it’s OK). What’s so special about our all purpose flour anyway? I didn’t know there was a difference.
I didn’t find them eggy at all. My brother is very sensitive to that kind of thing and he didn’t find them eggy either.
I had to put them in longer that 14 minutes but my oven temperature might be messed up. No, I don’t have an oven thermometer.
The first time I made them with lemon buttercream icing and the second time last night I made them with mocha buttercream.
You do need to watch that you bake them for JUST the right amount of time. I did notice last night when I made them, they did rise and the tops were rounded after 14 minutes, but they were still raw so I put them in for 5 more minutes. This resulted in the tops becoming flatter and slightly more golden brown than they ought to have been. They had a slight “crisp” to the top of them. Was it noticeable when I loaded them up with mocha buttercream? Nope, not at all, they looked and tasted awesome and had the same lovely texture and flavour.
That’s really the minor caveat I can think of. I’m going to try to make a double layer cake out of the same basic recipe soon. Cheers!
I’m so happy to hear that Logan, its quite a story :). I’m glad you are pleased with the recipe.
Have you tried doubling this recipe?
Catherine, I haven’t but one of my readers recommended to do it in separate batches. For what ever reason it did not worked for them to double it. It may be because if you leave the batter on the counter while the first batch is baking, it may effect how effective the baking soda and baking powder are in the recipe. I have always personally made separate batches.
Hello! I was wondering if I used
all-purpose instead of the cake flour, would it make a big difference?
They are not as fluffy with all purpose flour. Do you have cornstarch? Click on the link in the recipe to make your own cake flour. All you need is all purpose flour and cornstarch and sift the two together to make cake flour. The cornstarch mixed with flour produces a very tender crumb.
Hello, is it just me or I’ve been reading comments on here and they are saying about using cake flour instead of all purpose flour. But the recipe calls for APF?
Hi Cathy, these already have a very soft crumb – they might be overly soft with cake flour. I haven’t tested it with this particular cupcake though.
WOW! I made the effort to make the flour and the butter milk and I was not disappointed.
I used a traditional butter cream frosting and my finished product was the best cupcake I have ever consumed. I can clearly see why everyone wants more than one!
Thank-you
Wendy, thank you for such a rave review and you are very welcome 😁.
Thank you so much for sharing this recipe, I made this into a 6 inch 3 layer birthday cake I just doubled the recipe and it was a huge hit with the birthday celebrant and her guests. I wish I could upload the pic on here but I don’t know how…
Thank you for such a nice review Sheila and great job improvising the recipe 😃.
Would this recipe work for 2 6 inch pan?
I think it could work, but you probably won’t have a very tall cake. If you test it out, let me know how it works out!
Hi, I’m looking forward to trying these cupcakes! My question is can I substitute butter ( regular or unsalted) for the canola oil? If so how much? And will it change the consistency of the cupcakes?
Hi Kendra, I haven’t tried that substitution so I can’t say for sure. Since baking is so much a science, I don’t really like to guess or assume anything without testing it myself. What I have found with butter in some cupcake recipes is that they tend to become firm, especially after refrigeration. I don’t know if that would happen here though.
I experimented with the recipe last night. I baked three batches: original recipe with oil, then a batch substituting the oil for melted coconut oil (I added lime and lime zest and some coconut) and then a final batch with melted butter.
First of all, the original recipe was fantastic! It wasn’t greasy and it was a very nice and fluffy cupcake. I also used all-purpose flour and found they had great domed tops and made 15 very large cupcakes. (no one is complaining here) :). I left some out of the fridge last night but in a covered container. To my surprise they were still fluffy and moist this morning. Test one complete!
The second batch I made I wanted to make a lime-coconut flavor. I added 2 tbs of fresh squeezed lime juice, some lime zest, half a cup of finely shredded coconut and replaced the oil with melted coconut oil. Still, FANTASTIC. This may be the best recipe ever. Although coconut oil hardens similar to butter, the cupcakes were not as dense as using the creamed butter method and it added a nice buttery flavor as well. I didn’t leave these out last night but put them in the fridge to see what happened. They do get a bit firm but that would be okay if you wanted a stiffer cupcake or used this for a cake.
Lastly I tried the same recipe but replaced the oil with melted butter. (I made these ones chocolate by removing 1/4 cup of the flour and replacing it with a Dutch cocoa). Baked up fluffy and perfect again! I did both tests with these, some in the fridge and some in a container left out. This morning the ones in the container were as soft and fluffy as the original ones with oil (good news!). However, the ones in the fridge did dense up as suspected but again, if you needed to make a denser cake vs fluffy cupcake that would be a good way to do it.
All in all, thank you Natasha for this wonderful recipe! It will really be my go to from now on as even with a few tweaks can be very versatile and you can make these any flavor you want.
I absolutely love that you experimented and even more that you shared your results and details with us! I’m so happy to hear all of your experiments worked!! You must know that I will be trying your methods!! Thank you so much 🙂
Thanks for the recipe . i tried it yesterday for my daughter’s birthday . I made a vanilla and chocolate version by subtituting 1/4 of flour by cocoa powder and the result was perfect!
Thanks again
Kaouter, I’m so happy to hear that! Thank you for sharing your great review and nice job improvising! 😁
Hi and thank you for the most amazing Perfect Vanilla cupcake recipe! My baby boy is turning 1 soon and I am so happy that I finally found the most yummy cupcake!! I wanted to make a two layer cake in 8 or 9 inch pans. Will this recipe work? Would I double it for two pans? Cooking time?
Again thank you,
Rebecca
I have not tested it as a two layer cake, but the original recipe author said you could double the recipe for two layers. I assume the bake time would be the same, but it is best to do the toothpick test.
I made these cupcakes the other day and they were delicious! I have a party coming up and would love to modify the recipe to make champagne cupcakes, any tips? They would be greatly appreciated!
Thank you!
Hi Lily, since baking is so much a science, I really can’t recommend anything I haven’t tested myself. It does sound nice though. If you try it out, let me know how it works out. Sorry I can’t be more help.
I’m making these cupcakes for my daughter’s second birthday party and, in terms of timing, wondered if it would be better to make the batter a day ahead or the actual cupcakes a day ahead? If I make the cupcakes a day ahead, how would you suggest I store them for the day? Appreciate any help!!
Hi Sylvia, if you’re making the cupcakes only (unfrosted), you can make and bake them a day ahead and leave them loosely covered with plastic wrap at room temperature. I wouldn’t make the batter in advance because the rising agents (baking powder and baking soda) will lose their effectiveness.
Great taste! Nice and fluffy, and not too sweet! Works great with any icing that I’ve tried: sugar, buttercream, chocolate… you name it!
Thank you for sharing.
Thank you for the nice review Dayna and you are welcome 😬