Muffins and cupcakes - please explain differences

[motherofvikings]

Just that really.

Muffins are bigger (in my cooking) and have no icing. They often have something lumpy (banana etc) in them.

But if I was to ice a muffin, would it then become a cupcake?

Muffins have milk in the recipe, and tend to be more "lumpy" in shape whereas cupcakes are standard sponge and have a smooth top before being iced.

no an iced muffin would be an iced muffin

they are made differently with different proportions of fat:flour etc

muffins are usually made by keeping dry and wet ingredients separate until the last minute, then mixing, also often liquid fat (melted butter or oil). muffins tend to have bigger air pockets, which i think is to do with the raising agent and often added acid via buttermilk etc

cupcakes/fairy cakes i would first cream butter and sugar together before adding eggs then flour etc, the crumb is denser and more cake-like (iyswim)

Undecorated cupcake/fairy cake

Muffin - see the top is craggier.

YY muffin texture is closer to dense cakes like fruit cake, whereas cupcake identical to sponge cake.

I've never had any luck with muffins. Has anyone got a foolproof recipe I can try please?

i've used this one successfully, but mix dry ingredients and wet ingredients separately before combining quickly. don't have to mix them together properly, the mixture sort of 'fizzes' when you combine

as you can see in the ingredients it has double the raising agent (SR flour plus baking powder), so much more aerated

Thanks all! :)

This is what happens when you zone out of the technical bits on GBBO! :)