Zoella’s Pumpkin Spice Cupcake Review

Who’s down for a little autumnal baking?! I used Zoella’s Pumpkin Spice Cupcake recipe, which you can find on her blog here. Her’s is based on one she found at allrecipes.com (which is another website I love for recipes, though it can be a little hit or miss). And here, ladies and gentlemen, is my Zoella’s Pumpkin Spice Cupcake Review in which I answer your burning question: does it actually taste nice?  Zoella’s Pumpkin Spice Cupcake recipe is in the UK standard grams instead of cups, so the first thing I did when I saw it (weeks ago), was convert it all into cups using an online converter. Big issue: it converts them to amounts that can be quite difficult to use, like 2.8 cups… what does this MEAN? (I ended up using very rough amounts). Moral of the story: invest in cup sizes AND a baking scale. HAVE IT ALL. BE UNIVERSAL.

*Note: I have since invested in a baking scale, super cheap and super worth it.

Cupcakes Batter

Ingredients

280g plain flour
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2 eggs, room temperature
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
110g butter, softened
200g caster sugar
5 tablespoons brown soft sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
180ml milk
250g pumpkin, cooked and pureed

Directions

Preheat the oven to 190C. As Zoe said, these make quite a few, I didn’t need two full trays of muffin tins, but I did need more than just one, so get out two trays and line at least one, then line the second as needed.

Mix together the flour, spices, salt and baking powders into a bowl. *Note: if you are using pie filling pumpkin, as I did, you do not need to add anymore spices as they are already mixed into the pre bought pumpkin! You can check online if your pumpkin already has spices.
In an electric mixer, mix together the butter and sugars until they are incorporated and light and fluffy.

Add in the eggs, one at a time. Stir in the milk and pumpkin puree.

Mix in the dry ingredients from the other bowl until it’s all combined. I usually add in only half at a time. Pour the mix into the lined muffin tins. I took Zoe’s advice of using an ice cream scooper for this part and WOW, it works so well! But it really helped that I had a scooper which has a button to empty the scoop, you know? It’s not just an ice cream scooping spoon. 

Baking Time

Zoe baked her for around 20 minutes she said, I only put mine in for 18, but ended up taking them out at around 14 minutes as the bottoms were burning. I made the novice mistake of putting the baking rack too close to the bottom, silly me. Just make sure you’re watching the cupcakes every couple minutes so that they don’t burn!

Icing

200g cream cheese, softened
50g or 1/5 cups butter, softened
350g or 4 and 1/2 cups icing sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Directions

Beat the cream cheese and butter in a mixer until well-mixed together. Then, add in the icing sugar and beat slowly. After, add in the cinnamon and vanilla and beat until it’s all mixed together.

Ice the cupcakes either using a pipe or just a spatula (piping makes it so much prettier, but I didn’t have one and I’m sad about it). Make sure the cupcakes have fully cooled, otherwise it will all just melt off.

The Verdict?

Even though the bottoms of mine burned a little, it was pretty easy to cut that part off and the rest is still super yummy! My mom is Celiac and she can’t have any of the cupcakes so I kept the leftover icing to the side for her to enjoy, haha! Definitely the best icing I have ever made, 10/10 would recommend trying out this recipe if you have some extra pie filling left over from Thanksgiving! There you have it — my Zoella’s Pumpkin Spice Cupcake Review! It worked better than I thought it did. It’s quite a bit of work, but I might make the trouble again for a special occasion.

Let me know what YOUR favourite pumpkin recipes are, I still have tons of leftover pumpkin to use!

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