Yesterday was littlest’s birthday. I cannot believe we are already celebrating his first birthday. The first year with baby is tough. Celebrating a child’s first birthday is more a celebration for the parents having made it through.
Each baby is different. Littlest is our second child. Having my first son, I learned an incredible amount from being a first time parent. A first child has the remarkable ability to turn a new parent’s life upside down. With littlest, I feel like the greatest thing I learned this last year is to enjoy the present. This time around, I have felt more focused on being present in each stage of development. I have come to believe that grace is something of elastic. The more present an individual is, the more grace is able to amplify. Before I go further down this philosophical path, I will change gears to tell you more about these cupcakes.
My littlest man is lucky as he has two cousins within weeks of his age. A couple of weekends ago we celebrated littlest’s 1st birthday early while family was in town. I did not have much time for recipe development so I pulled a go-to vanilla cupcake recipe for the party. They were tasty. I liked the rich vanilla and butter taste, but the cakes turned out denser than I hoped for. I had already had aspirations to try avocado cupcakes as I have heard how tender they are.
Before you say, “Jess, that is crazy. I am not putting avocado in my cake. It belong on my toast or in my guac.”- hear me out. Banana bread is tasty and moist, right. Avocado will make a similarly tender cake. To push the cake into a light and fluffy state, I had a few tricks up my sleeve.
In this recipe, the avocado replaces the butter. Vegetable oil and baking soda are added for further leavening. They also create a moist, airiness in the cakes. This recipe is intended to make 12 regular sized cupcakes. Adjust the recipe for party size.
These cupcakes are awesome with a homemade vanilla buttercream frosting. It was my first attempt at piping frosting so please excuse the slight messiness. The good news I can share with you is you don’t need fancy cake decorating bags to frost cupcake. Just a homemade parchment paper cone will suffice. Next time I will cut a slightly larger opening for piping cupcake frosting.
Yields 12 Cupcakes
Ingredients
- 1 avocado
- ⅔ granulated sugar
- ¼ cup vegetable oil
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- ½ cup milk
- 2 eggs
- 1 ½ cup flour
- 1 ½ tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp baking soda
- ¼ tsp salt
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350F. Cream the sugar into the avocado by hand or using a stand mixer. Mix in the vegetable oil, vanilla extract, milk, and eggs. Blend until smooth.
- In a medium mixing bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
- Slowly add the dry mix into the wet mix. Only mix until the dry ingredients are incorporated.
- Spoon the mix into baking cups. The recipe should make 12 cupcakes. Bake for 22 minutes.
Frost the cupcakes as desired. My current favorite buttercream frosting is from blogger Wine & Glue. Cut the recipe in half to pipe frost 12 cupcakes.