How To Make Strawberry Cupcakes From Scratch

It’s time to learn how to replace Chemical X strawberries with real strawberries. This recipe for How To Make Strawberry Cupcakes From Scratch taste so much better than store-bought cupcakes and is just dirt cheap by comparison. We’ll go ahead and dive into the ingredients list:

Where can you find cupcakes that taste like strawberry shortcake? How to make strawberry cupcakes from scratch?

Real Strawberry Cupcakes

Most strawberry cake recipes ask you to use artificially flavored gelatin. This one uses only uses fresh ingredients. Also makes a great cake!

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Recipe Summary

Prep:

40 mins

Cook:

25 mins

Additional:

10 mins

Total:

1 hr 15 mins

Servings:

12

Yield:

12 cupcakes

Ingredients

Decrease Serving

12Increase ServingAdjust

Original recipe yields 12 servingsIngredient Checklist

• 8 large fresh strawberries, or as needed
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup white sugar
• ⅓ cup vegetable oil
• ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
• ½ teaspoon lemon zest
• 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• 3 tablespoons instant vanilla pudding mix (Optional)
• 1 drop red food coloring, or as needed (Optional)
• ¾ cup cream cheese, softened
• 2 tablespoons butter, softened
• ½ cup confectioners’ sugar
• ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3 large fresh strawberries, sliced

Directions

Instructions Checklist

• Step 1Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Spray cupcake cups with cooking spray, or line with cupcake liners.
• Step 2Place 8 strawberries into a blender, and blend until smooth. Pour the puree through a strainer to remove seeds. Puree should equal about 3/4 cup. Set the puree aside.
• Step 3In a large bowl, beat together the eggs, white sugar, vegetable oil, 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract, lemon zest, and strawberry puree until well combined. Stir in the flour, baking powder, salt, vanilla pudding mix (for a moister cupcake), and red food coloring to reach a desired shade of pink. Spoon the batter into the prepared cupcake cups, filling each about 2/3 full.
• Step 4Bake in the preheated oven until the cupcakes have risen and a toothpick inserted into the center of a cupcake comes out clean, about 23 minutes. Allow the cupcakes to cool at least 10 minutes before frosting.
• Step 5To make frosting, beat cream cheese and butter together in a mixing bowl with an electric mixer until smooth, and mix in confectioners’ sugar and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract to make a lump-free icing. Frost each cupcake with about 2 tablespoons of icing, and top each cupcake with a strawberry slice.

Strawberry Cupcakes with Strawberry Buttercream Frosting

Have you ever seen cupcakes so pretty? These Strawberry Cupcakes are made with chunks of fresh strawberries in the cake batter and are topped with a luscious pink Strawberry Buttercream Frosting. These cupcakes are just bursting with flavor and would go down a treat at any celebration!

Strawberry Cupcakes with Creamy Strawberry Frosting

I know, I post a ridiculous amount of cupcake recipes. But really, can you blame me? If I were to do a cookbook someday, it might just be a cupcake cookbook because I’m just that obsessed with them. And I can’t even begin to tell you how obsessed I am with these strawberry cupcakes. A-MAZ-ING!

They are hands down the best strawberry cupcakes I’ve ever had, and they’ll likely be your new favorite too. Yes, that could sound totally braggish (since it’s my own recipe), but I’m kinda thinking these deserve bragging rights :).

Last week I made a layered strawberry cake. Very similar to these, but I topped that with a cream cheese frosting. Well, when you combined cream cheese frosting with sliced strawberries between cake layers things can get a little slippery.

Loved the cake, just not the way it held up, so I made these strawberry cupcakes with strawberry buttercream frosting to share instead. And I actually preferred going all strawberry instead of a cream cheese frosting, because it didn’t diminish that sweet strawberry flavor at all. It just added to it, of course.

Getting The Strawberry Flavor Just Right

In the past, I’ve tried many strawberry cupcake recipes and they’ve all left me wondering, where is the strawberry flavor? I’d see a hint here and there but these, oh these!

They are overflowing with strawberry flavor. The liquids of this batter are made up of a strawberry puree and milk blend, then chopped fresh strawberries are folded into the batter.

Then after they are baked they are topped with more fresh strawberries (which is a lovely hidden surprise underneath the frosting), and then more strawberry puree is creamed into the fluffy, melt-in-your-mouth homemade buttercream frosting.

And the key to the frosting is that it is made with a strawberry reduction (meaning we are going to simmer off 2/3 of the waters in the berries so we can concentrate that irresistible strawberry flavor).

Yes, it would be nice if we could just add 2/3 cup of fresh strawberry puree into a frosting but we all know that’s not going to happen without a royal disaster, soup of a frosting.

This is definitely my new favorite strawberry buttercream frosting and I know I will  make it time and time…and time again. If you are lucky enough to have any frosting left, spread it on graham crackers for a delicious treat.

The cake batter has plenty of chunks of fresh strawberries in it so you get the best strawberry flavor in every bite! To make the batter a cute pink color, I added a few drops of food coloring, but you can leave that out if you prefer, it won’t affect the taste.

Strawberry Cupcake Ingredients

For this moist and fluffy strawberry cupcake recipe, you’ll need:

• Cake flour
• Baking powder and baking soda
• Salt
• Butter
• Granulated sugar
• Eggs
• Buttermilk
• Vanilla extract
• Fresh strawberries
• Red food coloring (optional)

For the creamy strawberry buttercream frosting, you’ll need:

• Fresh strawberries
• Butter
• Powdered sugar
• Vanilla extract
• Red food coloring (optional)

How to Make Strawberry Cupcakes

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
• Sift cake flour into a bowl, then add the baking powder, baking soda and salt.
• Whip butter and sugar until pale and fluffy. Then mix in the egg and egg whites.
• Whisk together the buttermilk, part of the strawberry puree and vanilla extract.
• Add the flour mixture and buttermilk mixture to the butter mixture.

• Fold the diced strawberries into the batter. Divide it amongst the lined muffin cups.

• Bake until toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

How to Make Strawberry Buttercream Frosting

• Add strawberry puree to a small saucepan. Heat mixture over medium-low heat, and simmer, stirring occasionally until reduced.
• Pour reduced puree into a small bowl, then freeze until cool.
• Whip unsalted and salted butter until very pale and fluffy.
• Mix in part of the powdered sugar, then blend in reduced strawberry puree, vanilla extract, and optional red food coloring. Add remaining powdered sugar and continue to mix until frosting is pale and fluffy.

• To assemble the cupcakes: Place some diced strawberries in the center of the cooled cupcakes then pipe the frosting around it. These cupcakes are packed with strawberries and taste incredible. Try not to skip this step because it’s so worth it!

How to Store Cupcakes

Store the strawberry filled cupcakes in sealed containers once cooled. Try not to squish the frosting when you put the lid on!

Can You Freeze Cupcakes?

You can freeze the unfrosted cupcakes for months, cakes freeze really well! When you’re ready to enjoy the frozen strawberry cupcakes, sit them out on your counter to thaw completely before frosting.

Tips for the Best Strawberry Cupcakes

• Let the cupcakes cool completely before topping them with frosting.
• Add a few drops of pink food coloring to the batter and frosting for a deeper red color.
• If you don’t have buttermilk on hand, you can use a buttermilk substitute. I give instructions for my buttermilk substitute in the recipe card below.

Strawberry Cupcakes with Strawberry Buttercream Frosting

PREP25 MINS

COOK15 MINS

TOTAL40 MINS

These homemade Strawberry Cupcakes are so fluffy, moist and made from scratch! Frost them with a swirl of sweet, homemade Strawberry Buttercream Frosting and a whole strawberry!

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MOIST AND FLUFFY STRAWBERRY CUPCAKES

Maybe it’s because I’m a girl mom, but I adore all things pink! Pink makes me happy like sunshine and rainbows. Strawberries – my favorite fruit – also make me smile. So, just imagine how excited I get for a pink strawberry cupcake with strawberry buttercream frosting, layered pink cupcake liners and fresh strawberries on top!

This recipe is perfect for using up fresh ripe strawberries. These cupcakes are so moist, fluffy, and PINK. They bring all the strawberry flavor power with a homemade, from scratch strawberry cake using pureed strawberries and diced strawberries. Then that delicious cake is frosted with a homemade strawberry buttercream frosting! The strawberry lover in your life is really going to love these! 

GETTING THE STRAWBERRY FLAVOR JUST RIGHT

My trick to getting the strawberry flavor in these cupcakes just right is using my own homemade strawberry puree in both the cupcake batter and the frosting AND folding in chopped bits of fresh strawberries.

To make the strawberry puree, I add diced strawberries into a small saucepan and heat them over medium-low heat. Then, I cook the strawberries until they break down and turn into a puree, being sure to stir them often. Depending on how ripe your strawberries are, you may need to use a masher to help break them down.

Strawberry Cupcakes

Play Video

This strawberry flavor bomb goes into both the batter and the frosting, ensuring that not a single bite of these cupcakes isn’t completely infused with real fresh strawberry flavor.

INGREDIENTS FOR STRAWBERRY CUPCAKES

For these super moist cupcakes, you’re looking at all of the usual cake ingredients, plus some fresh strawberries for my homemade strawberry puree.

Here’s everything you’ll need:

• all-purpose flour
• baking powder
• baking soda
• salt
• eggs
• sugar
• pure vanilla extract
• vegetable or canola oil
• buttermilk
• strawberries

HOW TO MAKE STRAWBERRY CUPCAKES

1. Prep: Preheat the oven to 350°F and fill two cupcake pans with cupcake liners. Then, set them aside.
Dry ingredients: Whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Set this mixture aside.

2. Wet ingredients: In a large mixing bowl, beat the eggs until they’re slightly frothy. Gradually add in the sugar beating for about 30 seconds until everything is well combined. Add the oil and vanilla. Beat the mixture until it is smooth.

3. Combine: Gradually add the dry ingredients, alternating with buttermilk, until all the ingredients are added and the batter is well combined. This batter will be thin. Fold in 1/2 of the strawberry puree and the diced strawberries.

4. Bake: Divide the batter into the cupcakes liners, filling each until about 3/4 full. Bake the cupcakes for 13-15 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool completely and frost with strawberry frosting.

INGREDIENTS FOR STRAWBERRY FROSTING

I love to top my strawberry cupcakes with a strawberry buttercream.

Here is everything you’ll need for strawberry buttercream frosting:

• unsalted butter
• powdered sugar
• strawberries
• milk, half-and-half or heavy cream
• homemade strawberry puree

HOW TO MAKE STRAWBERRY FROSTING

1. Mix: Add the butter to a large bowl or mixing bowl for your stand mixer. Beat the butter until smooth and creamy. Gradually add in powdered sugar, alternating with milk, until smooth.

2. Add: Fold in remaining strawberry puree and diced strawberries, beat until well combined. Decorate cupcakes with frosting, and top with fresh strawberries if desired.

TIPS FOR PERFECT STRAWBERRY CUPCAKES

Follow these simple tips for the perfect bite of strawberry cupcakes every time:

• Make sure you use room temperature eggs. Room temp eggs will better incorporate into the batter and make your cupcakes as moist and fluffy as possible.
• Make sure you beat your eggs until they are frothy. This will also keep the batter, and your cooked cupcakes, light and airy.
• For the most flavor power, add both strawberry puree and diced strawberries to both the frosting and the batter.
• Make sure your cupcakes are completely cooled before you attempt to frost them. You put so much hard work into that frosting, you don’t want it melting!

HOW TO STORE FROSTED CUPCAKES

Storing your already frosted cupcakes can get a little tricky. You don’t want them to tip, squish, or stick together. Store them in an airtight container. The best option is the type that is designed specifically for storing cupcakes. You can keep them in your fridge for 5-7 days. Let them come to room temperature before serving! 

YIELD: 24 CUPCAKES

STRAWBERRY CUPCAKES WITH STRAWBERRY BUTTERCREAM FROSTING

These homemade Strawberry Cupcakes are so fluffy, moist and made from scratch! Frost them with a swirl of sweet, homemade Strawberry Buttercream Frosting and a whole strawberry!

PREP TIME25 minutes

COOK TIME15 minutes

TOTAL TIME40 minutes

INGREDIENTS

STRAWBERRY PUREE

• 8 medium strawberries, diced

STRAWBERRY CUPCAKES:

• 2 ½ cups all-purpose flour
• 2 ½ teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 4 eggs, room temperature
• 1 ½ cups granulated sugar
• 3 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• 1 cup cooking oil, (vegetable or canola)
• 1 cup buttermilk
• 3 medium strawberries, finely diced

STRAWBERRY FROSTING:

• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
• 6-8 cups powdered sugar, depending on consistency wanted
• 4 medium strawberries, finely diced
• 2-4 tablespoons milk, half-and-half or heavy cream, depending on consistency

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Strawberry Puree: Add half diced strawberries into a small saucepan over medium-low heat. Cook until strawberries break down and turn to puree, stirring often. You may need to use a masher depending on how ripe the strawberries are. Divide puree in half and place bowls in refrigerator to chill while you continue with recipe. 
2. Strawberry Cupcakes: Preheat oven to 350°F and fill two cupcake pans with cupcake liners, set aside.
3. Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Set aside. 
4. In a large mixing bowl, beat eggs until lightly frothy. Gradually add sugar beating about 30 seconds until well combined. Add oil and vanilla, beat till smooth. 
5. Gradually add dry ingredients, alternating with buttermilk, until all ingredients are added and batter is well combined. (Batter will be thin.) Fold in 1/2 of the strawberry puree and diced strawberries. 
6. Divide into cupcakes liners, 3/4 full. Bake for 13-15 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool completely and frost with strawberry frosting. 
7. Strawberry Frosting: Add butter to a large bowl or mixing bowl for stand mixer, beat until smooth and creamy. Gradually add powdered sugar, alternating with milk, until smooth.
8. Fold in remaining strawberry puree and diced strawberries, beat until well combined. Decorate cupcakes with frosting, and top with fresh strawberries if desired.

Pink Strawberry Cupcakes

These Pink Strawberry Cupcakes are a sweet and pretty strawberry cupcakes recipe.  Utilizing fresh or frozen strawberries, this is a delicious strawberry cupcake recipe made from scratch.  Watch the video showing you how to make this recipe, then scroll to the bottom of this post and print out the recipe so you can make them at home.

How to Make Strawberry Cupcakes with Fresh Strawberries:

If you want to make strawberry cupcakes, you can certainly find a box of strawberry cake mix at the store and go with that.  But the flavor of the boxed mix isn’t going to bring forth the delicious flavor of fresh strawberries.  So how do you use fresh strawberries to make cupcakes?  In this recipe, you’ll be using frozen strawberries that you will puree.  If you have fresh strawberries on hand, you can pop them in the freezer until frozen and then puree them.

Cake flour is used in this cupcake recipe to give it a nice, cakey texture.

Watch the video below to see how to make this recipe!

Pink Strawberry Cupcakes

Play Video

Fair warning:  don’t taste the cupcake batter.  It tastes like strawberry ice cream, and you may be tempted to grab a straw!!

These cupcakes turn out to be a lovely shade of light pink, but I help that process along with a squirt of pink/red gel paste. You can leave the coloring out and the cakes will be slightly pink, but they’re much cuter with a darker tint.

Pink Strawberry Cupcakes are a darling little dessert to serve at little girl’s birthday parties, baby showers and spring and summer celebrations.  Everyone loves a good cupcake.  And this is a good cupcake!

I frost these with my Wedding Cupcake Buttercream recipe- I highly recommend you try it!  Just tint it with a little bit of red gel paste to get a nice pink hue.

Thank you to Miranda from the CookieDoughAndOvenMitt.com blog for shooting beautiful photos of these cupcakes for me!

Pink Strawberry Cupcakes

Pretty pink cupcakes for special occasions!

Recipe Details

Prep Time: 20 mins

Cook Time: 20 mins

Total Time: 40 mins

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: American

Keyword: cupcakes, pink, strawberry

Calories: 199kcal

Ingredients

• 2¼ cups cake flour
• 1½ cups granulated white sugar
• 2¾ teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup (1½ sticks) butter, at room temperature
• 3/4 cup pureed frozen strawberries (about 1/4 of a 1 pound bag)- let them come to room temperature before using in the recipe
• 4 large egg whites
• 1/3 cup milk
• several drops red/pink food color or gel paste

Instructions

• Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line 18 cupcake pan with paper liners.
• In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt; set aside.
• In a large bowl use an electric mixer to blend the butter with the strawberry puree. Add the flour mixture and blend until light and fluffy (the batter will be very thick).
• In another bowl, whisk together the egg whites, milk and dye. Add whites in three parts to the batter mixture, mixing only until incorporated after each addition.
• Fill the cupcake liners about 3/4 full. Bake 18 to 22 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.
• Let the cupcakes cool completely before frosting

Strawberry Cupcakes

These soft, fluffy, tender homemade strawberry cupcakes are so delicious. If you love strawberries and you love cupcakes you have got to try this recipe.

Time to amp up that basis vanilla cupcake recipe with some awesome strawberry flavor. Sure you can buy a strawberry cupcake mix from the store, but making it from scratch is so much better.

Top them off with swirls of homemade buttercream frosting and then some strawberry slices and you are in for a real treat.

This moist strawberry cupcakes recipe from scratch is so easy to make too. If I can do it, you can do it. Time to impress your friends and family. Let’s get baking!

Step 1: Gather the ingredients

In order to make these divine strawberry cupcakes you will need the following easy to find ingredients:

• Flour – I like to use cake flour, but you can use all-purpose/plain flour as well if you like. The cake flour will produce a lighter and more airy cupcake.
• Baking powder
• Salt
• Butter – Either salted or unsalted
• White granulated sugar
• Eggs
• Vanilla extract
• Sour cream – This is optional or can be substituted with Greek yogurt. It helps the cupcakes to be moister. If you don’t care about moistness, then you can certainly leave it out. Can’t find sour cream? You can make homemade sour cream.
• Milk – You can use whole milk, 2%, 1%, almond, etc.
• Strawberries – Of course, the star of this dish. You can’t have strawberry cupcakes without strawberries, that would just be silly.
• Red food coloring – This is an optional ingredient for added color.

Step 2: How to make strawberry cupcakes at home

Begin by preheating your oven to 350 F/176 C. If you are using a convection oven, I would set it to 3255/162 C. Now let’s make that cupcake batter.

In a medium bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt. You can easily just use a sifter too if you want. I do like to sift my cake flour.

Then in a large bowl cream together the softened room temp butter with the sugar. If you forget to set the butter out you can just put it in the microwave for a few seconds to soften it up, or in the oven.

Now add in the vanilla extract and one of the eggs and mix those in until just combined, followed by the last egg. Once you are done you can add in the sour cream followed by the milk.

Don’t have sour cream? You can use Greek yogurt too if you like, or try using this homemade sour cream substitute. But if you don’t mind your cupcakes a bit more on the drier side, leave it out altogether.

Once you are done, put the mixer or stand mixer away and use a spatula or spoon to mix in the flour mixture a third of it at time. This ensues the batter doesn’t get over-mixed. Over-mixing the batter can cause more dense, and chewy cupcakes. Scrape the sides of the bowl as needed.

Step 3: Gotta love strawberries

How do strawberry cupcakes get their name? Well because of the fresh strawberries of course. Chop up a bunch of fresh strawberries until you get roughly a cup worth. You can even do a little more if you like.

Fold those strawberries into the batter. Then if you would like to add some drops of red food coloring to the batter you can, or you can leave it out, totally up to you. The cupcake batter is complete.

Step 4: How to bake strawberry cupcakes

Time to fill up those cupcake/muffin pans with paper cups. Then I usually use a 1/2 cup measuring cup and scoop in enough cupcake batter to fill them up about 3/4 of the way full. You should be able to get at least 24 cupcakes out of the batter.

Bake the strawberry cupcakes on the middle rack for 16 to 24 minutes until when you poke them in the middle with a toothpick it comes out clean.

Once they are done baking, allow the cupcakes to cool in the pan for a few minutes before removing them and placing them on a wire cookie rack to cool completely. You cupcakes are done! Or are they? Time to decorate them.

Step 5: Decorate the strawberry cupcakes

You can decorate the cupcakes however you like. I like to use this homemade buttercream frosting in a piping bag with a star tip.

I also like to add slices of strawberry on top with the frosting. You could do some red sprinkles if you wanted or maybe add red food coloring to the frosting. Maybe you want to add a little strawberry puree to the frosting as well. So many options you can try out. Enjoy!

Can I make a strawberry cake instead of cupcakes?

Of course! To make a strawberry cake take two 9-inch round cake pans. Grease and flour them, and then divide the same exact batter equally between the two pans.

Bake them in a preheated oven at the same temp, for 25 to 30 minutes until the toothpick comes out clean. Allow them to cool for a bit and then remove the cake layers from the pan to cool on the rack completely. Then layer and frost and decorate to your heart’s desire.