The Simple Hack For Making Your Own Cupcake Liners In A Pinch

If you love baking, visitors to your kitchen may find you making delicious cupcake recipes. Perhaps you've tried Cookies N' Cream Cupcakes, Vanilla Cupcakes with American Buttercream, Ghostly Chocolate Cupcakes, or Pink Champagne Cupcakes. This also probably means that your kitchen drawer may be filled with cupcake liners, the paper containers that hold your cupcake batter in your muffin tins while they bake, as well as your finished cupcakes. However, if you open that drawer and find that you don't have any cupcake liners, you don't have to run out and head to the store. You can use parchment paper to create cupcake liners as a convenient substitute. 

All you need to make liners out of parchment paper are a drinking glass, measuring tape, and scissors. Cut a sheet of parchment paper into a square that measures 5 by 5 inches. Grab your drinking glass, turn it upside down, and place it on your table or counter. Take your 5 by 5 square sheet of parchment paper and place it over one of the muffin tin cups. Then, press down on the paper with the bottom of the drinking glass. Do this as many times as you need to fill your muffin tins.

There are several benefits of putting liners in your muffin tins when you bake cupcakes, which is why forgetting to use cupcake liners is one of the mistakes you should avoid when baking cupcakes. One of those benefits is that the liners are great for food safety because they protect your cupcakes from contamination while handling them. Another benefit is that the liners protect your baking pan from stains and erosion since they create a barrier between the pan and the cupcake batter. You can make these layers of protection even stronger with your DIY liners.

After you create your parchment paper liners, stuff them inside thicker liners to create double-layered liners that will better protect your cupcakes and your pan. Liners to use that are thicker than parchment paper include foil liners, tulip liners, and silicone liners (silicon liners can be washed and reused, and they're nonstick). But, if all you have is parchment paper and you want to give your DIY cupcake liners a nice aesthetic, you can still mold them into a pretty shape.

Tulip liners are fashioned into the shapes of tulips and make decorative containers for cupcakes. Using these liners can be particularly striking when baking cupcakes for special occasions such as birthday parties, holiday celebrations, weddings, and baby showers. You can create the shape of tulip liners with parchment paper to give your DIY liners a stunning visual presentation.

Cut your parchment paper into square sheets that measure 6 by 6 inches. Grab a cup with a flat bottom that fits into your muffin tins. Turn the cup upside down on your table or counter, and place the square of parchment paper over the bottom of the cup. To keep the paper in place and centered, hold it in place with your finger and thumb on one hand. Then, you can start folding the paper into pleats around the bottom of the cup, making sure the folds are evenly spaced.

Make your folds crisp and tight. Once you've created all of your folds, use your hand to flatten the bottom of the paper. Remove the paper from the cup, and you'll have a beautiful tulip-shaped cupcake liner made of parchment paper that perfectly fits your cupcake pan. Now that you've executed a creative idea to contain your cupcakes, you may be inspired to use even more creative cupcake ideas.