With these blueberry cupcakes, swoops and swirls of ethereally airy sweetened whipped cream usurp the role of cloying frosting, lending the playful sweet a more adult-like air. In a playing grown-ups sorta way. Equally adept at squashing cravings at breakfast or brunch, dessert or midnight nosh.–David Leite
Blueberry Cupcakes
Ingredients
For the blueberry cupcakes
- 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 1/2 cups cake flour, (not self-rising), sifted
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 2 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
- 1 3/4 cups sugar
- 4 large eggs, room temperature
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 1/4 cups milk, room temperature
- 2 cups fresh blueberries, plus more for garnish
- Whipped cream
For the whipped cream
- 2 cups heavy cream
- 1/4 cup confectioners’ sugar, sifted
Instructions
Make the cupcakes
- Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C). Line standard or mini muffin tins with paper liners.
- In a large bowl, whisk together both flours, baking powder, and salt. With an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy.
- Reduce speed to low. Add flour mixture in 3 batches, alternating with two additions of milk, and beating until combined after each. Fold in blueberries by hand.
- Add the eggs, 1 at a time, beating until each is incorporated and scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed. Beat in the vanilla.
- Divide the batter evenly among the lined cups, filling each 3/4 full. Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until pale golden, about 25 minutes for standard cupcakes and 15 for mini cupcakes.
- Transfer the tins to wire racks to cool completely before removing the cupcakes. Cupcakes can be stored up to 3 days at room temperature in airtight containers.
Make the whipped cream
- Just before serving, in a large bowl with a handheld mixer or the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, whisk the heavy cream until soft peaks form. Add the confectioners' sugar and whisk until combined. (You can tightly cover and refrigerate the whipped cream for up to 3 hours in an airtight container.)
Frost the cupcakes
- Dollop or pipe the whipped cream onto the cupcakes. (If piping, use a piping bag or a large resealable plastic bag with 1 bottom corner snipped off.) Sprinkle with berries. Serve immediately. (If you need to keep the cupcakes longer, wait to frost them until just before serving.)
☞ TESTER TIP: The whipped cream topping is, as the recipe indicates, is at its finest when the cupcakes are devoured immediately. Truth be told, though, the frosted cupcakes hold up fairly well overnight in the fridge.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Recipe Testers’ Reviews
Everyone loved these blueberry cupcakes. The end result is a nice cupcake that isn’t overly sweet with a cool dollop of whipped cream to make it a tasty treat.
The use of whipped cream is perfect, as I believe regular icing would overpower the cupcakes. But wait to put the whipped cream on the cupcakes until just before you are going to eat them, as they tend to get soggy if you let them sit very long.
The younger kids liked the mini ones, but the adults preferred the regular cupcakes. I feel there was a better blueberry-to-cake ratio in the larger muffins. Also, the mini cupcakes dried out quickly. While my yield on the regular cupcakes was the same as the recipe indicates, my mini cupcakes made 8 dozen. It took my mini cupcakes about 20 minutes to bake.
Most cupcakes are too sweet for me but these blueberry cupcakes were just right. After making the batter, I tasted it and decided it needed a little something extra. Lemon came to mind so I made 1/2 the cupcake batter as the recipe called for and the other half I added 1 teaspoon lemon flavoring. After they had cooled, I tasted each one and that little bit of lemon pushed it to a “10” for me. My husband doesn’t like lemon but liked both those with lemon and without.
Hi. These cupcakes look fruity and delicious. Could you advise how many standard cupcakes this quantity of batter makes? I do prefer a larger cupcake and would like to bake regular sized ones soon?
Useful to know exactly how many mini cupcakes the mixture yields as I’m sure there will be an occasion when the mini ones would be just perfect.
Look forward to a quick reply! Thank you.
Deborah, for a regular (or slightly generous) cupcake, you’d likely get at least 24 cupcakes. For mini cupcakes, I think you could expect around 6 dozen, although our testers have made as many as 8 dozen from a single recipe. Do let us know how they turn out.
Hi my name is Jackie and I have a friend good who wants me to make them cupcakes but there’s one problem the person CAN’T have (butter or milk) in anything I was wondering what can I use to substitute those 2 items.
Jackie, I so admire your wanting to please your friend. It’s really tricky, though, to substitute for dairy in recipes that were designed to be made with butter since baking is such a science. Since we haven’t attempted those modifications with this recipe, I’m really hesitant to recommend anything, simply because we test everything before we put it on the site and without doing that I can’t guarantee your results and would hate for you to be disappointed and waste your ingredients. May I suggest you instead try a cupcake or cake recipe that naturally doesn’t contain dairy? There are tons of cookbooks out there now that cater to this audience, although one cake recipe that I know and trust is this orange olive oil cake recipe that turns out a cake that’s moist and rich and wonderful. For cupcakes, perhaps start checking the wee cakes for doneness after about 25 minutes but be prepared to leave them in much longer as this is a dense cake. Good luck!