How to make whoopie pies

The ubiquitous cupcake is under threat from the new pie on the block, the whoopie pie, so I decided it was high time to try out my whoopie pie pan and taste these cake sandwiches myself. (What is a whoopie pie? Find out here.)
After searching far and wide through tons of whoopie pie recipes, I settled on vanilla bean whoopie pies with Nutella buttercream filling. Who can resist any recipe that has Nutella in the ingredient list?

This recipe makes approximately 24 pies. The vanilla bean pies have been adapted from Whoopie Pies by Sarah Billingsley.
Download print-friendly version.

Ingredients for filling:
60g butter
1/2 cup Nutella
1 cup icing sugar
approximately 1 tbsp of milk

Ingredients for the pies:
90g salted butter
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1/2 cup buttermilk, at room temperature
2 tsp milk, at room temperature
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp white vinegar
2 and 1/4 cups cake flour
1 and 1/2 tsp baking powder
Seeds from 1 vanilla bean (or 1 tsp vanilla extract)
Method:
1. Preheat your oven to 180°C.
2. Grease your whoopie pie pan with butter, or spray with non-stick spray.
3. Cream the butter, white sugar and brown sugar together with an electric mixer for approximately 2 minutes, until light and fluffy.
4. Add the eggs and buttermilk, and beat until combined.
5. In a separate bowl or cup, combine the milk, baking soda, and vinegar.
6. With the mixer on low, add half of the flour, followed by the milk mixture and then the rest of the flour and the baking powder. Beat just until everything is combined.
7. Add the seeds from the vanilla bean and beat until they are mixed in.
8. Now you need to scoop some dough into your prepared pan. (I used a piping bag to get my pies nice and round, but this isn’t essential.) The pies will rise and expand quite a bit when they bake, so use about a tablespoon of dough for each pie.
9. Bake the pies, one pan at a time, for 8-10 minutes or until they are just beginning to brown.
10. To prepare your buttercream filling: mix together the butter and Nutella, then add the icing sugar and some milk and mix until smooth. Add more milk if necessary.
11. Once your little pies have cooled use a palette knife to apply a generous layer of filling to one side of your pie and place another pie on top to make a sandwich.
12. EAT and enjoy!

The great thing about whoopie pies is the endless number of flavours to experiment with, as well as the fact that you can mix and match different cakes and fillings to your heart’s desire. They’re fun afternoon tea snacks, delicious lunch time treats and great presents or party favours when packaged beautifully.

Keen to get yourself a whoopie pie pan? Here you go.

Whoopie pies, we like you.