Cupcakes

Method

1. mix4 min
   cream 1/2 cup butter + sugar, pale and fluffy
   the standard creaming contract, sized down — the cupcake's crumb rides on this air the same as its big sibling's
2. mix2 min
   eggs one at a time, then 2 tsp vanilla
   each absorbed fully — a small batter curdles even faster than a big one when the eggs rush in
3. fold3 min
   flour + baking powder + salt alternating with milk
   ending on flour, stopped at the last streak — cupcakes forgive less overmixing than cake: the same toughness that a fork ignores, a bare hand and a first bite notice immediately
4. bake18 min
   350°F, lined 12-cup tin, 2/3 full, tester clean
   an ice-cream scoop portions them even, and even portions are why a bakery's dozen all crest identically — pulled the minute a tester comes out clean, because a cupcake overbakes in the time a cake shrugs off
5. rest25 min
   5 in the tin, fully cool on a rack
   completely before frosting — the law, enforced at cupcake scale where the mass is small and the cooling is mercifully quick
6. whisk6 min
   buttercream: 1/2 cup butter, then sugar, then cream
   butter beaten smooth first, powdered sugar in stages on low, then cream + remaining vanilla + a pinch of salt on medium until it holds a swirl — the pinch of salt is what keeps American buttercream from tasting like sweetened butter, which is otherwise exactly what it is
7. top8 min
   piped or swirled with a knife
   onto fully cool cakes — a zip bag with the corner cut pipes a respectable swirl, and the difference between homemade-looking and bakery-looking cupcakes is ninety percent this swirl and ten percent everything above