Apple Pie Cupcakes are the perfect easy fall dessert. The soft and fluffy vanilla cupcakes, spiced apple pie filling and cream cheese creme diplomate frosting marry so well creating a trio of seasonal goodness. These cupcakes are guaranteed to be your new fall favorites!
what are apple pie cupcakes?
Apple Pie Cupcakes are all of the delicious apple flavor of apple pie, turned into cupcakes. I personally find making cupcakes way easier and less fussy than making pie. Plus, these cupcakes feature my signature cream cheese creme diplomate frosting to round out the flavors for an insanely delicious bite. There are three elements to these Apple Pie Cupcakes:
- The Fluffy Vanilla Cupcakes are made with oil instead of butter for an extra light crumb plus vanilla bean paste for a huge punch of flavor!
- The Warm Apple Pie Filling is made by finely chopping your favorite apple (mine’s Honeycrisp) and cooking the apple pieces down with warm spices, brown sugar and cornstarch. This filling then gets scooped into each baked cupcake as well as spooned on top of the frosting.
- The Cream Cheese Creme Diplomate Frosting is luxurious and special. It is made by blending vanilla bean pastry cream, softened cream cheese and whipped cream until you’re left with the lightest, silkiest frosting imaginable.
I won’t say much more, these cupcakes really do speak for themselves. Please send photos (karisscorner@gmail.com) of your finished bakes, I love to see them!
looking for more fall goodness? Try my…
Can baking be therapeutic?
I often talk about baking being a therapeutic hobby but I’d like to share more about why I feel that way as well as how it can become a relaxing hobby for you!
When I bake, it’s my creative time. I may put on my favorite nostalgic movie or tv show in the background, or a Spotify playlist titled “French café” and leave my troubles behind.
Sometimes I pour myself a glass of wine and light a candle. Then, with the mood set, the mixing of batter, kneading of dough and smoothing of icing is my only care in the world.
When I say baking is therapeutic, sometimes people respond saying “not for me it isn’t!” I completely understand why someone might feel that way. There have been plenty of times where I spend hours on something only for it to fail or something breaks that shouldn’t or I forget to clean as I go and am left with a disastrous kitchen to clean.
So I should in reality, have a caveat to my “baking as therapy” claims…
Baking is therapy when you curate the experience to be relaxing.
How do you curate that relaxing experience for yourself, you ask?
How to make baking therapeutic…
- Prepare your mind–know that it’s okay if the cake doesn’t rise, or the butter wasn’t chilled enough. Shift your mindset from seeing your failures as mistakes to seeing them as opportunities for learning.
- Prepare your space–I cannot and will not bake on top of a messy kitchen. If I were to do this I would be starting from a place of stress! Take an extra 10 minutes to clean any dishes in the sink and wipe down the counters, this small effort will pay you back greatly in brain space and clarity.
- Clean as you go! I’ll tell you the one way to make baking stressful and tiresome, is to not clean as you go! After I use each ingredient that I no longer need, I put it away.
After each major step in the process, I wipe down the counters and put dishes that are no longer needed in the sink. If there is chill time or baking time I don’t sit, I do the cleaning then. Make this shift and you’ll really notice the difference!
By the way, this last tip really helped me when I was on The Great American Baking Show–and the crew that cleaned up behind us made a point to tell me that my workspace was always so clean they didn’t have much to do!
I would reply by saying “it’s how I stay sane in this tent!”
Additional suggestions:
*Maybe try printing off the recipe instead of looking at it on your phone, tablet or laptop and use this time to unplug from technology for a few hours
**Invite friends or family over to share your creation with you. Time spent with loved ones over food is a universally special experience
And that’s how I discovered baking for my mental health. If you try any of these suggestions, let me know how it went for you! I’m really invested in spreading this message to others in hopes that baking will enhance your lives more than it already does!
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Apple Pie Filled CupcakesYield: 12 cupcakes Prep Time: 40 minutes Cooling Time: 30 minutes Baking Time: 15 minutes Total Time: 1 hour and 25 minutes |
Ingredients:
For the Cupcakes
- 2 c (250g) all purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 c (110g) neutral oil (vegetable, canola or sunflower)
- 1/2 c (100g) granulated sugar
- 2 eggs (room temperature)
- 3/4 c (180ml) buttermilk (room temperature) or (180ml milk + 1 tsp vinegar)
- 1 1/2 tsp vanilla bean paste (or extract)
For the Apple Pie Filling
- 1 apple (~145g) (honeycrisp preferred)
- 1/4 c (50g) light brown sugar
- 1 tsp cornstarch
- 1/4 tsp nutmeg
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- pinch of salt
- 1/4 c (60ml) water
For the Brown Butter Cream Cheese Frosting
- 8oz (1 block) cream cheese (room temperature)
- 1/2 c (120ml) heavy cream
- 1/2 c (100g) granulated sugar
- 3 1/2 tsp (10g) cornstarch
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 2 large egg yolks
- 1 c (240ml) whole milk
- 2 Tbsp (28g) unsalted butter, cold
- 1 1/2 tsp vanilla bean paste (or extract)
Instructions:
For the Cupcakes
- Preheat your oven to 350oF (roughly 180oC) and prepare your cupcake pan by lining it with 12 cupcake liners.
- In a medium mixing bowl, sift together 2 cups (250g) of all purpose flour, 1 tsp of baking powder, 1/2 tsp of baking soda and 1/2 tsp of salt, then whisk to combine.
- In a separate large bowl, or the bowl of your stand mixer, add 1/2 cup (110g) of a neutral oil and 1/2 cup (100g) of granulated sugar and beat or whisk by hand until combined.
- Scrape the sides of the bowl with a spatula and then add 2 eggs at room temperature, 3/4 cup (180ml) buttermilk (or 180ml of whole milk + 1 tsp of vinegar) at room temperature and 1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract. Beat/whisk by hand again to combine.
- Add the dry ingredients into the wet and mix carefully until combined. It’s best to mix by hand to ensure you don’t overmix.
- Place even amounts of cupcake batter into the cupcake lined tin and bake for 14-16 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of one of the middle cupcakes comes out clean and the cupcakes have a nice dome.
- Remove from the oven and set aside to cool completely.
For the Apple Pie Filling
- Cut your apple into small quarter inch squares (this may seem tedious, but the apples need to be small enough to fit into the center of the cupcake).
- Place the cut apple, 1/4 cup (50g) of light brown sugar, 1 tsp of cornstarch, 1/4 tsp of nutmeg, 1/2 tsp of cinnamon and a pinch of salt into a medium saucepan and stir to get all of the apples pieces coated in the dry ingredients.
- Add 1/4 cup (60ml) of water to the saucepan and bring to a boil.
- Reduce down to a simmer and allow to cook until the mixture thickens (2-3 minutes) stirring continuously.
- Set the apple pie filling aside to cool completely. This can be made a day in advance.
For Cream Cheese creme diplomate Frosting
- Start by making the pastry cream, it’s easier if you measure out all of your ingredients before starting. Directly into a small/medium saucepan, add 1/2 c (100g) of granulated sugar, 3 1/2 tsp (10g) of cornstarch and 1/2 tsp of salt and stir with a whisk to combine.
- Into the saucepan add the 2 large egg yolks and a splash of the milk and whisk to combine well. Then add the rest of the milk and whisk to combine.
- Put the saucepan onto the stove and cook over medium/low heat until the pastry cream thickens and looks like the consistency of pudding.
- Remove the saucepan from the heat and stir in 2 Tbsp (28g) of unsalted butter and 1 1/2 tsp of vanilla bean paste (extract is fine but paste is way better here).
- Get the pastry cream out of saucepan and into a bowl and cover with plastic wrap allowing the plastic wrap to touch the top layer of pastry cream; this minimizes the chance of the pastry cream forming a film on top. Allow the pastry cream to come to room temperature fully (about 30 minutes).
- When the pastry cream has fully come to room temperature, it’s time to assemble the frosting.
- In a large bowl, add the room temperature cream cheese (8oz/1 block) and use a hand mixer to blend until smooth.
- Add the cooled pastry cream, a few spoonfuls at a time, mixing in-between the spoonfuls until all of the pastry cream and cream cheese have combined.
- In a separate clean medium bowl, add 1/2 c (120ml) if heavy cream and with clean beaters, beat the cream until stiff peaks form.
- Using a spatula, take about 1/3 of the whipped cream and gently fold it into the cream cheese pastry cream mixture. Do this again two more times until all of the whipped cream is mixed in.
- Add the cream cheese creme diplomate to a large piping bag.
For the Assembly
- Take completely cooled cupcakes and create holes in the center of each cupcake using a cupcake remover tool, a round teaspoon or a melon scoop.
- Fill the hole in the center of each cupcake with the completely cooled apple pie filling, making sure that the filling is level to the top of the cupcake and does not overflow (if overfilled, icing the cupcake will be more difficult).
- Pipe the cream cheese creme diplomate frosting generously on top of each cupcake, then create a small well in the frosting to serve as a holder for some extra apple pie filling to go on top of each cupcake.
- Take some of the leftover apple pie filling and add it to the well over each cupcake.
- Enjoy!
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