Hot Milk Cupcakes with Vanilla Buttercream Frosting

When I {sorta, barely sorta} homeschooled Jack and Max when they were little preschoolers, our first lesson was on darkness and light. I took them out for ice cream after our first day to celebrate.

Because I knew how it would go down:

Jack would choose chocolate.
Max would choose vanilla.

Darkenss. Light. Homeschool #winning.

{I made a video of our first day of school those many years ago. I am NOT watching it because it will render me useless, curled up in the corner, weeping for all that's been lost for the rest of the day. You, however, can watch it here if you're so inclined.}

{Also. If you want to make a cheap, massive bulletin board for anywhere in your home, I wrote a picture tutorial for how we made the camo one in the video here.}

Six years later, and my Max will still, always, every time choose vanilla. Vanilla ice cream. Vanilla cookies (i.e Snickerdoodles). Vanilla pudding.

And, ALWAYS, vanilla cupcakes.

After testing, re-testing, playing, dabbling and tweaking, I've finally come up with the PERFECT vanilla cupcake.

The batter, made with warmed milk and butter, a recipe from my husband's grandmother - renders cake that is spongy, not-too-sweet, and SO buttery and soft, but sturdy enough to hold its own. If you have a kitchen, you will ALWAYS have on hand all of the ingredients to make these cupcakes.

The frosting? It's a divine, perfectly sweet, buttery (notice a theme?), magical topper for Grannymom's batter.

These little hands. My tiny helper. Love me some Whit.

Also, you can pipe on this frosting and make it swirly and finished. But, I love the simple, homemade look of just spreading it on with a knife and adding a few sprinkles. (*You can easily color it as well with food coloring.)

Whit: They look like fwuffy cwouds. Totally.

Try these. I know you'll love 'em as much as we do.

Here's the recipe:

Hot Milk Cupcakes

2 cups flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
1 cup milk
2 sticks butter
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Sift together flour and baking powder. Set aside. Cream together sugar and eggs.

In a small pan, heat together milk and butter until butter is melted. Add flour mixture to egg mixture and beat well. Then add hot milk with butter mixture. Beat until smooth. Add vanilla and mix until combined.

Line muffin pans with liners (or grease with cooking spray or butter). Using an ice cream scoop, fill each liner with batter. Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes.

Cool. Top with Vanilla Buttercream Frosting.

Yield: 2 dozen cupcakes

Vanilla Buttercream Frosting

1/2 cup butter, softened
2 cups confectioner's sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
Approximately 6 tablespoons milk

Beat butter with mixer. Slowly add confectioners sugar to combine with butter. Add vanilla.

Beat in milk, one tablespoon at a time until you reach desired consistency.

Top cupcakes with frosting.