These Strawberry Cupcakes are made with fresh, juicy strawberries and topped with a delicious vanilla buttercream frosting.
Love strawberries? This summer try this homemade Strawberry Ice Cream when the berries are at their peak!
When I was a kid, my favorite snack was strawberries. In the summer, my mom used to fix me up a bowl of fresh strawberries, juicy as all can be, and I’d go find a good spot to lie back and daydream. Though the summer strawberries were already sweet and juicy, I loved adding a little powdered sugar to the bowl and dipping the strawberries in it.
These Strawberry Cupcakes remind me a bit of those lazy summer days. The cupcakes are fluffy and moist and topped with a vanilla buttercream. And while they require a few more ingredients than strawberries and powdered sugar, they’re easy to make.
They’re great during summer when strawberries are at their peak, but they’re also good for Valentine’s Day… or add a few blueberries on top and enjoy them for July 4th!
The recipe was adapted from Averie Cooks’ Strawberry Banana Bread recipe, so you could also forget the frosting altogether and serve them as strawberry banana muffins for breakfast!
Tips to Make the Best Strawberry Cupcakes
I know it’s tempting to use a strawberry cake mix, but you can totally bake these! Here are a few helpful tips to help:
Make sure your ingredients are at room temperature. It really does make a world of difference when it comes to baking because it allows all the ingredients to mix evenly. If you’re short on time, know that I cheat sometimes (ok, a lot) and warm up my butter in the microwave (about 10 seconds is usually enough) if it’s cold. To warm up eggs, place them in a bowl of hot water. You’ll find they come to room temperature pretty quickly.
To prevent the strawberries from making your batter too moist, toss them in flour. Tossing the strawberries in flour doesn’t seem to have a big effect on whether or not they sink to the bottom, however. To prevent this, you need to fill the bottom of your cupcake liners with a layer of batter that doesn’t have any strawberries in it. Check out my Lemon Blueberry Cupcakes recipe for more details.
Use white liners so you can see your cupcakes! I love using liners in various colors, but if you bake these in white liners, it makes a nice contrast with the bright white Vanilla Buttercream Frosting.
When you’re making the Vanilla Buttercream Frosting, if you find it’s too dry, add a tablespoon more milk. Too wet? Add a 1/4 cup of powdered sugar. Continue until you reach a consistency that stays on the spatula when you lift it out of the mixing bowl but doesn’t feel stiff.
If you love strawberry recipes, here are a few more to try!
- Strawberries and Cream Cake
- Easy Strawberry Tart with Strawberry Champagne Jam
- Strawberry Rhubarb Galette
Strawberry Cupcakes with Vanilla Buttercream Frosting
Print Recipe
Ingredients
Cupcakes
- 2 cups strawberries (coarsely chopped)
- 1 1/2 cup flour (divided)
- 1 cup mashed banana (from 2 large bananas)
- 1/3 cup vegetable oil
- 1 large egg
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1/4 cup sour cream
- 2 tsp. vanilla extract
- 1/2 tsp. baking powder
- 1/2 tsp. baking soda
- 1/4 tsp. kosher salt
- 1-2 drops red food coloring (optional)
- whole strawberries (for topping)
Vanilla Buttercream Frosting
- 3 cups powdered sugar (divided)
- 1/2 cup butter (room temperature)
- 1 tsp. vanilla extract
- 2-3 Tbsp. milk (divided)
Instructions
For the Cupcakes
- Preheat oven to 350°F. Line two muffin tins with 18 cupcake liners.
- Toss chopped strawberries with 1/4 cup flour in small bowl.
- Mash banana in small bowl.
- Whisk oil, egg, brown sugar, sugar, sour cream, and vanilla extract together in large bowl.
- In a separate bowl, stir together 1 1/4 cups flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
- Add flour mixture to oil mixture. Stir until combined or mix on low speed. Add banana. Add strawberries. Add food coloring if desired.
- Bake for 12-15 minutes or until cupcakes bounce back when gently touched. Let cool completely on cooling rack before frosting.
For the Vanilla Buttercream Frosting
- Add butter to mixer fitted with paddle attachment. Add 2 cups powdered sugar. Cover bowl.
- Turn mixer on medium and mix until consistency resembles pebbles. Add vanilla extract and 2 Tbsp. milk. Turn speed to high.
- Reduce speed and add 1/2 cup powdered sugar. Alternate between powdered sugar and milk until desired consistency is achieved. Turn mixer on high for 60 seconds. Frost cupcakes and top with whole strawberry.
Notes
Tell me your favorite cupcake flavor in the comments below!
My background is in publishing (I've worked at Parade, Men's Journal, Us Weekly, Stuff, Blender, Beachbody, and more), mostly with a focus in health, fitness, and entertainment. I've also run my own baking company and competed on Cupcake Wars, so hit me up with your baking questions!
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Gorgeous beauties!!! I love that you used mashed banana in this recipe. Super yum!!
Thank you! I found it adds sweetness and helps make these strawberry cupcakes super moist!
Blessed you to have memories of your childhood eating fresh strawberries 🍓. Never had fond memories of strawberries growing up. But, in Oxnard CA is where we have strawberry festival in the Us where we live. The best strawberries ever! Now adding a cupcake to that is heavenly.
Oxnard strawberries are so good! I live in Los Angeles, so I make it up there every so often, and we get those strawberries at the farmers markets here!
Beautiful looking cupcakes with classic flavors, love ti!
Thanks so much, Renee!
These are so beautiful. I think that sometimes the classic flavours are the best. Also, I want to eat that frosting out of the bowl.
Thank you! I’m such a fan of vanilla frosting too 🙂 If you really want to oomph up the vanilla flavor, add the seeds of 1/2 a vanilla bean!
What a wonderful summer dessert! Love how these cupcakes are on the lighter side, too.
Thank you! I love that they’re relatively low in calories too (well for a strawberry cupcake)!
Ooooh, I love these! No better combo than straw-nana… WITH frosting. 🙂 Need to try these soon!
Thank you! Let me know how you like them!
Bananas, strawberries and that luscious vanilla buttercream 😀😀 Yumminess 😍😍
Whoa! It has banana too! 😀
Man every time I see your desserts, my cravings go nuts! haha! Your desserts are always so pretty and amazingly delicious looking!
Thank you! I feel the same way about your recipes!
For these, the vanilla frosting makes these strawberry cupcakes a dessert, but if you skip the frosting, you could totally have them for breakfast!
Delightful cake!!! It is very yummy, Thanks for providing so simple recipe that everybody can understand and can get savor of a delicious cake.
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Hi! for how many days do you think I can store these cupcakes? I want to make these for my daughters birthday, but I want to make them 3-4 days ahead. Do you think they will be ok if I do the frosting on the day of the party?
Thanks!
Hi! I always make my cupcakes the day of if possible. They’re freshest and tastiest that way! But, if that’s not possible, I would make them the day before – I find any earlier and they start to get a little dry and dense.
While surfing, i got this. I love the recipe and really want to adopt it for my online cake portal. (https://www.way2flowers.com/cakes ). Hope everyone likes it and give us positive reviews, which goes to you only.
Can you taste the banana in this cupcake?
I don’t believe you can and I haven’t heard complaints of the strawberry cupcake tasting like banana, but please let me know if you think it’s too banana-y!
I had to triple the recipe and something went wrong 😩 they looked great in the oven but as soon as I had them out they sunk 👎oh well, they still taste good, and I’ll just cover up the ugliness with icing! 😋
Olya! Oh no! I’m glad they tasted great, but if you’re willing to share your process below (or feel free to shoot me an email at hello@letseatcake.com), hopefully I can help troubleshoot why they sank. That’s such a bummer!
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it looks good and I know it will taste even better, I’m definitely gonna try it, keep posting such recipes.
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