A relaxing night of cupcake baking: Banana cupcakes + vanilla cupcakes with chocolate chips

For our annual Christmas party with my husband’s side of the family, we were tasked with bringing a dessert. Instead of picking something up at the grocery store, I was inspired to bake. It was one of those days where I wanted to escape, for lack of a better word, into the kitchen. Cooking and even baking have really become stress relievers for me, which is good because being in the kitchen used to be much more stressful!

I decided to spend the night making banana cupcakes and vanilla cupcakes. The former because I had some ripe bananas that were asking to be baked, and the latter because I figured they would be fun, easy and a better dessert option for a party.


The banana cupcakes were like cupcake-shaped banana bread with cream cheese frosting. Hard to go wrong with that. The recipe I used was from Cooking Light, so they were a little better than many recipes on the fat and calories front. The main difference was that the cupcake recipe called for low-fat plain yogurt. Here's the recipe for these cupcakes --> Banana cupcakes with cream cheese frosting

The vanilla cupcakes won the day – not surprisingly – with a creamier and sweeter flavor. They really hit the spot. I used a recipe from browneyedbaker.com; find the full recipe here --> Vanilla cupcakes with vanilla buttercream frosting.

The only change I made to the vanilla cupcake recipe – primarily because I didn’t have the requisite ingredients – was using cream cheese instead of butter in the frosting. That’s one thing I’ve learned in this quest. That when I don’t have the right ingredients, there’s usually an alternative that is just as good if not better. Buttercream vs. cream cheese frosting – I’m good with either. In my short baking career, I've also found cream cheese frosting travels better.

Another option I tried and recommend with vanilla cupcakes: Mix mini chocolate chips into the batter for a chocolate chip cupcake. I sprinkled chocolate chips on top of the frosting when they were done, as well.

The sour cream in the vanilla cupcake recipe made the
batter creamy, which resulted in very moist cupcakes.

Ready to frost the banana cupcakes with cream cheese frosting - cream cheese plus powdered sugar and a 1/2 tsp vanilla extract = delicious. For the vanilla cupcakes, I followed nearly the same recipe
but used a full tablespoon of vanilla extract.

The banana cupcake recipe called for toasted walnuts. I burned a lot of my walnuts, which
I toasted on the stovetop. I was able to salvage enough to put a few on each cupcake.

The finished vanilla cupcakes. For some I just sprinkled chocolate chips on top. I also mixed chocolate chips in with the cupcake batter to make about half dozen vanilla chocolate chip cupcakes. I recommend this!