Healthy Very Vanilla Cupcakes

It's time to celebrate another birthday! Be prepared for a few more birthday posts coming soon, as there are quite a few August birthdays (including our very own Papaya Crumpet!). My dearest friend Rose wanted something 'vanilla' so I made her vanilla cupcakes topped with vanilla cream cheese frosting. All white (technically, off-white) and classy.

Healthy Very Vanilla Cupcakes

Somewhere on this blog, I have previously mentioned my back luck with cupcakes. Traditional butter-laden versions and healthy versions alike have problems when I attempt to bake cupcakes. Usually the top is covered in holes or the texture is heavy and dense. But this vanilla cupcake recipe seemed to end my streak of bad luck! We can celebrate this too, haha!

Piping Cream Cheese Frosting Roses on Healthy Very Vanilla Cupcakes

This recipe was so quick to put together and yielded round cupcakes that rose above their liners. Only one mixing bowl needed! No problems were encountered when I switched these to make regular sized cupcakes instead of mini ones. I was so excited to see they looked like normal cupcakes when pulled out of the oven. No need for extra fiddling with the oven temperature and watching them like hawks. One toothpick check and they were finished~

Healthy Very Vanilla Cupcakes

This is a considerably healthy cupcake because of the low amount of sugar and oil. For one loaf or a dozen cupcakes, I always stay under half a cup of sugar. Since these vanilla cupcakes were for friends, I used half a cup. However Eat Good 4 Life noted that a third cup is sufficient if adding icing. She even used whole wheat flour, which would up the amount of fibre but in sacrifice for a darker colour. Either way, I approve of this recipe and would try it again! It is a cupcake I could eat without knowing it will completely sabotage my diet.
 
The texture wasn't the lightest and fluffiest cupcake I've had (check out Papaya Crumpet's earl grey cupcakes if you're looking for a fluffy cupcake), but they were acceptable. Maybe this is due to the fact I only had half a cup of pastry flour to use so some all purpose flour was mixed in. Vanilla paste or extra vanilla bean would make these even better. That's how these cupcakes can become 'very vanilla'.

Healthy Very Vanilla Cupcakes with Rose-shaped Icing

I kept with a 'rose' theme with the gifts I was giving her, and icing these cupcakes using my Wilton 2D Closed Star tip was a no brainer. Plus, it gives the cupcakes that 'professional cupcakery' look. I used a traditional cream cheese frosting, which was the only unhealthy part. No recipe is included below because I kind of just made it from scratch. Mixing the cream cheese and butter by hand (because poor Coconut Crumpet doesn't even own a hand mixer...much less a beautiful pink Kitchen Aid...) and adding icing sugar until the consistency I wanted was achieved. To be honest, I think I must've added too much because it was a bit too sweet. Thank goodness the cupcakes themselves weren't already filled with sugar!

Healthy Very Vanilla Cupcakes

Yield: 11 large cupcakes

Adapted from Eat Good 4 Life

Ingredients

• 1 egg
• ¼ cup coconut oil, melted
• 1 cup milk
• 1 tbsp vanilla
• 1 ½ cups all purpose flour
• ½ cup pastry flour
• 1 ½ tsp baking powder
• ½ tsp baking soda
• A few grinds of Himalayan pink sea salt

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350˚F. Line a muffin pan with paper liners.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together egg, oil, milk, vanilla, and sugar until well combined.
3. Sift in flours, baking powder, and baking soda. Add a few grinds of Himalayan pink sea salt.
4. Fold batter until just combined. Over mixing yields large holes in the cupcake!
5. Scoop batter into prepared pan using a cupcake scoop or ice cream scoop.
6. Bake for 15 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean or with just a few crumbs.
7. Cool completely before frosting.

Love from Coconut Crumpet's Corner ♡

Flavours of Nanaimo Cake

Flavours of Nanaimo Birthday Cake

The Nanaimo bar. The no-bake three-layered bar is named appropriately after its city of origin and has been given the title of British Columbia's favourite dessert. Now, I'm not sure if all British Columbians love the Nanaimo bar, but I do know it is my brother's favourite dessert. Very well, he is a British Columbian...

Born on the seventh day of the seventh month, my brother must be a lucky boy, in certain ways. I have saved my family a lot of money baking cakes for birthdays and special events (and also doubling them up as gifts, puahahaha!) and his birthday is no exception. The reason why I didn't just make an actual Nanaimo bar is because of the few days expired carton of whipping cream sitting in my fridge door. The fastest way I could think of using it is by icing a cake. Too bad there aren't enough people to eat a two layered cake, that would've used even more whipped cream. I had to brave the hot oven on a summer day to make this cake -wipes imaginary sweat-.

Holey cake, revealing the bottom, texture of the cake