Light And Fluffy White Chocolate Cupcakes
These White Chocolate Cupcakes are light and fluffy and easy to make! The cupcake batter is made with melted white chocolate and the cupcake is topped with a luscious creamy white chocolate buttercream frosting! Its the perfect cupcake to take to any kind of party or potluck!

People either love or claim to hate white chocolate because it isn’t actually chocolate, but what is it exactly? As a professional pastry chef, it’s important to know the difference between white chocolate and milk chocolate, so let’s break it down.
White chocolate is a blend of cocoa butter, sugar, milk products, vanilla, and emulsifiers. As for the flavor, it’s kind of like vanilla and extremely sweet and has a buttery feel. That said, sometimes it can be a little too rich on its own-but when made into sweet treats like white chocolate raspberry cupcakes, or white chocolate brownies, it can taste like a dream!
The base of these cupcakes is my tried-and-true vanilla cupcake recipe. I added silky white chocolate to the mix, frosted them with white chocolate buttercream, and just like that -these HEAVENLY white chocolate cupcakes were born!
If you want to tripe the white chocolate you can drizzle this white chocolate glaze over the frosting.
To decorate you can top them with pieces of white chocolate or edible flowers.
Core Ingredients
This recipe uses all the regular baking ingredients you’d suspect but I just want to call out a couple things for a few ingredients.
White chocolate – You’ll need this for the batter and for the frosting. This is what gives the cupcakes a deep white chocolate flavor, its not just in the frosting!
Unsalted butter – You’ll need softened butter for the cake batter and the buttercream. Learn how to soften butter quickly if you forgot to leave it out!
Buttermilk – I chose to use buttermilk instead of regular because the acidity in buttermilk reacts with the leavening agents, causing the cupcakes to rise while making a moist-tender crumb and adding a touch of tangy flavor. You can use regular milk if you dont have buttermik.
Or you can make your own buttermilk by taking 1 tbsp out of a cup of milk and replacing it with 1 tbsp lemon juice or white vinegar and letting it sit for 10 minutes.
The best white chocolate for baking
The best white chocolate to use for baking is a white chocolate baking bar. White chocolate chips aren’t great for baking because they contain added stabilizers, making melting really tricky. Instead, go with a quality white chocolate baking bar like Ghiradelli, or Baker’s.
Melting white chocolate
Sometimes white chocolate can be hard to melt and will seize up on you if it’s overheated. This is why I recommend using baking bars instead. To melt, place the chocolate in a microwave safe bowl and melt for 25 seconds at a time stirring in between until fully melted.
You can also melt the chocolate over a double boiler. Heat 1 inch of water in a small saucepan and place a larger bowl on top. The bowl should not hit the water. Place the chocolate inside the bowl and stir until melted. The steam from the water will melt the chocolate.
Be careful not to get any water in the chocolate or it will seize up!
How to make the cupcakes
Make sure to fully preheat your oven to 350°F. This recipe makes 12 cupcakes. This is a fairly simple recipe to make, and it follows the creaming method for making cakes. This just means that the sugar and butter get creamed first to incorporate as much air as possible. Then the dry ingredients get combined in a separate bowl and are added in parts with the liquid ingredients.
This method of prepping a cupcake/cake makes sure the texture is super light, airy, and fluffy because of all the air thats whipped into the batter while creaming.
The melted chocolate in this recipe is a little curve ball but you’ll add it to the creamed butter and sugar before adding the first portion of dry ingredients.
How to make the frosting
For the full recipe and expert tips, head to my white chocolate buttercream frosting post. Here’s an overview of how it’s done:
Cream the butter and sugar: Mix butter and powdered sugar starting on low speed and gradually increasing to medium speed. Mix until fluffy.
Add white chocolate: Drizzle in melted white chocolate and continue mixing until incorporated. Mix in a splash of heavy cream, adding more until your frosting is light and fluffy. If it’s too thin, mix in more sugar.
Recipe tips for these cupcakes
- The best way to measure flour is with a scale. If you want to use measuring cups- spoon the flour into your cup, never scoop it from the bag or it will pack in too much flour resulting in a dense cupcake.
- The butter, eggs, and buttermilk must be room temperature for the batter to mix properly. If the cupcake batter is blended with cold ingredients, the cupcakes won’t bake up well.
- These cupcakes will rise quite a bit, so only pour enough batter to fill the muffin cups halfway. I use an ice cream scoop for this. It’s the perfect portion and gives the finished cupcakes a nice rounded top.
- These cupcakes are done when a toothpick comes out mostly clean with a few crumbs attached. They will continue to set as they cool.
- To decorate, I like piping a swirl with a star tip, but you can also cut a corner off a zip-top bag to use as a pastry bag.
Storing instructions
Storing – Frosted white chocolate cupcakes will keep in an airtight container at room temperature for 4-5 days or in the fridge for up to a week.
Freezing – They also freeze well if you do so before frosting. Place the cupcakes in a freezer-safe resealable bag. Press out all of the air and freeze for up to 3 months. Let thaw at room temperature, and frost the day you plan to serve them.
Light and Fluffy White Chocolate Cupcakes
Ingredients
- 1 ¾ cup flour, 210 g
- 1 tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp baking soda
- ¼ tsp kosher salt
- 4 oz white chocolate, (Such as Bakers baking bar)
- ½ cup unsalted butter, (113g) softened to room temperature
- 1 cup granulated sugar, (200g
- 1 egg, (50g)
- 2 egg white, (70g)
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- ½ cup buttermilk
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350F and line a muffin tin with 12 cupcake liners.
- In a medium size bowl combine the 1 ¾ cup flour, 1 tsp baking powder, ½ tsp baking soda, and ¼ tsp kosher salt. Whisk until combined and set aside.
- Chop the 4 oz of white chocolate and microwave it in a microwave safe bowl 25 seconds at a time, stirring in between each time until melted. Be careful not to overheat.
- In the bowl of a hand mixer or stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment cream the ½ cup butter and 1 cup sugar on medium speed for 1 minute.
- Add the melted chocolate and mix again for 30 seconds on medium speed.
- Scrape down the bowl and add the egg, 2 egg whites and 2 tsp vanilla extract. Mix for 1 minute on medium speed.
- Add in 1/3rd of the dry ingredients, then half of the buttermilk and alternate, starting and ending with the dry ingredients.
- Mix only until combined. Do not overmix.
- Using an ice cream scoop, scoop the batter into the muffin liners ONLY 1/2 of the way full. Bake for 18-20 minutes. This recipe rises a lot so make sure not to fill more than halfway.
- Cool and frost with white chocolate buttercream frosting.
Awesome
Wohoo! Thanks Tess! Isnt white chocolate fun to bake with!