Easy vegan strawberry cupcakes packed with real strawberries and flavour. They are perfect for Valentine's Day or any time of the year!
These vegan strawberry cupcakes are:
- DELICIOUS
- Pretty and pink
- Easy to make and use no weird/uncommon ingredients
- Fluffy but moist kind of like banana bread!
If you fancy cupcakes but something slightly different, see my vegan red velvet cupcakes, carrot cake cupcakes or coconut lime cupcakes recipe.
There are 3+ cups of strawberries in this recipe!
I wanted to make vegan strawberry cupcakes bursting with real strawberries. None of that vanilla muffin madness with bits of strawberries. And no strawberry essence!
Never fear, the ingredients needed to make these vegan strawberry cupcakes are common and include:
- Flour + sugar
- Baking powder
- Beetroot powder (or vegan-friendly pink/red food colouring)
- Strawberries (fresh or frozen will work)
- Plant milk + oil
- Apple Cider Vinegar (or white vinegar or lemon juice)
Just like banana bread, the more fruit you add, the better your cake tastes... however, it also means your cake will be heavier! To counteract this, I added 4 whole teaspoons of baking powder and a little apple cider vinegar to minimise any gumminess.
How to make these vegan strawberry cupcakes
It's super easy! Mix dry ingredients. Blend wet ingredients. Mix together then bake.
I experimented with reducing the strawberry puree on the stovetop. Creating a strawberry reduction would help minimise its water content therefore intensifying its flavour. That would be very useful for some recipes that need as little moisture as possible!
However, in this recipe, we need to add lots of liquid (milk). Making a strawberry reduction was unnecessary extra work.
Making these cupcakes PINK
To make these vegan strawberry cupcakes pretty, I used 3 whole teaspoons of beetroot powder. If you don't use it, your cupcakes will be an off-pink colour after baking.
When you add beetroot powder to the cupcake batter, it will turn veryyyy pink. The colour fades (and browns a little) in the oven so 3 teaspoons was just right!
All the pictures in this post feature cupcakes that are coloured with beetroot powder rather than food dye. I wanted to show you their true colour and there's minimal photo editing!
See my other vegan strawberry recipes:
- Vegan Strawberry Cheesecake
- Vegan Strawberry and Cream Tart
- Strawberry, pink pitaya and chocolate tart
- Vegan Jam Tartlets
You may also like:
Vegan strawberry cupcakes
Ingredients
Dry ingredients
- 2 ½ cups (310g) plain or all-purpose flour
- ¾ cup (150g) cane sugar
- 4 tsp baking powder
- 3 tsp beetroot powder, or a few drops of vegan-friendly red food dye
- Pinch of any good-quality salt
Wet ingredients
- 3 ¼ cups (390g) strawberries, fresh or frozen and stems chopped off
- 1 cup (250mL) plant-based milk, such as almond, soy or coconut
- ¼ cup (65mL) light-tasting vegetable oil, such as sunflower or rapeseed
- 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
To decorate (optional)
- ¾ cup (180g) vegan cream cheese, room temperature
- ¾ cup (170g) vegan butter
- 3 cups (300g) icing sugar, or to taste*
- Beetroot powder and/or freeze-dried strawberry powder, to colour and taste (optional)
- Fresh strawberries
- Freeze-dried strawberries or raspberries
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F). Line a cupcake tray with liners.
To make the cupcakes:
- Add all the dry ingredients to a large bowl and mix until combined or until there are no more big lumps. If you're using the food dye, use it with the wet ingredients.
- Blend all the wet ingredients (including the strawberries) in a blender until smooth. Add the strawberry mixture to the dry ingredients and fold until combined.
- Divide the batter between your cupcake liners.
- Bake the cupcakes in the oven for 15-20 minutes or until a skewer can be inserted into a cupcake and it comes out clean. The baking time will depend on the size of your cupcake tray and individual cupcakes.
- Cool the cupcakes in the tray for 5 minutes then cool them on a wire rack. These cupcakes may brown underneath which is normal. If you eat the cupcakes immediately, they'll stick a little to the liners (this happens when there's a lot of fruit in the cake). However, they'll peel away more easily when they are cool.
To make the frosting:
- Add the cream cheese and butter to a bowl or stand mixer. Cream until just combined. Add the sugar and mix until just combined. If you overmix the frosting, it will become loose and may not hold up. Add more icing sugar for a firmer frosting.
- If desired, add beetroot powder or freeze-dried strawberry powder to the frosting. Adjust to taste or colour.
- When the cupcakes are completely cool, use a piping bag with a star shaped nozzle to frost the cupcakes. Alternatively, use a knife to spread the frosting on the cupcakes. Decorate with fresh strawberries and freeze-dried strawberries/raspberries if desired
- Serve immediately. Alternatively, store the frosted cupcakes in an airtight container in the fridge up to 3 days. Allow them to slightly warm up at room temperature before serving. If the cupcakes are unfrosted, they can keep at room temperature/
Notes
This post was originally published in January 2017 and updated in February 2021.
Please leave a comment below if you made this recipe, have any questions or thoughts! Your comment will help other readers and Rainbow Nourishments.
Made this wonderful vegan buttercream frosting - delicious and looks very nice piped. Next time I will also make the cupcakes - the recipe takes more strawberries than I had to donate!
Can this this recipe be made GF???
Soo glad you loved the buttercream! With gluten free cupcakes, I normally use 50% almond meal/flour and 50% of a gluten-free flour blend. However, I haven't tried with this recipe. If you do make them gf, let me know how you go!
Thank you for developing this recipe! I live at about 8,000ft elevation, and always have to adjust recipes to avoid really messy disasters. When I first read this recipe, I was sure it would be a tricky one to adjust because of all that moisture and tour added leavening. I just wanted to share for any other high altitude readers that this recipe does NOT work, even with typical HA adjustments. I reduced the sugar by 10% and the baking powder by half, added a couple tablespoons of flour, and still got a mess. A lovely pink-hued and strawberry-flavored mess, but a mess. It was a joy to try tho! Thank you!!
Ooh, thanks so much for your reasonable feedback! Yes you're right, this recipe definitely has a lot of moisture etc but good to know that it didn't work for you at a higher altitude! I'll keep that in mind for my other recipes :).
Hands down one of the best Vegan cupcakes ever. You would never know if was vegan. The strawberry taste was incredible (I used fresh strawberries). Moist and delicious. I took them to work to share in the staffroom and they were a huge hit!!
That's music to my ears Mel! Soo glad you and your colleagues enjoyed them. Thanks so much for your comment 🙂
I made these with my son on Valentines day. The whole family loved them. Such a good recipe!
Yay, that's amazing! Thanks Lea!
I was wondering if you have ever experimented with this recipe being wheat free? I've got a toddler with some allergies and this seems such a lovely recipe to take to her daycare for when there are birthdays so she can be included! Also, do you know if they freeze well?
For gluten free goods, normally I use 1/2 almond meal (flour) and 1/2 gf flour blend (by weight) in the same quantity as the regular flour but I haven't tested this recipe yet! Also yes, they freeze well without the frosting :).
Ciao vorrei in italiano la ricetta dei cupcake vegani alla fragola e possibile? Grazie mille .
Hi, I don't speak Italian so had to use Google translator to understand your message. I don't provide recipes in other languages but you can use Google Translator to translate the whole recipe. Thank you!
Absolutely delicious! This recipe makes the most fluffiest and beautiful cupcakes!!! I found them very easy to make, and they were a huge hit. Everyone who tasted them were raving about how good they were. Didn’t have the beetroot powder but the strawberries and regular food colouring did the trick. Highly recommend!
Aw thanks for taking the time to leave your feedback Clare! I'm sooo glad you and everyone enjoyed them! xo
I made the cupcakes with no frosting. They are delicious--but there was a lot of batter! I think I could have made 14-16 cupcakes with this batter if I'd had a second muffin tin. Instead I made 12 rather mushroom-shaped cupcakes. I do really appreciate you giving gram measurements as I find that much easier than volume measurements.
Glad you enjoyed the cupcakes! Sounds like your cupcake tin was smaller than mine but that it make strawberry muffins instead! Thanks for your feedback 🙂
Mine came out extremely gummy. They also rose in the oven then after taking them out they deflated and looked all sad. Any idea what I did wrong? I measure by weight and dint make any adjustments other than used coconut sugar (but I do this for all my baking) and used frozen strawberries instead of fresh. Definitely want to try again but wondering if you might have any idea what I did wrong? Thanks!
Oh no! Coconut sugar has more moisture than regular sugar and since this is already a very moist recipe, it could've thrown out the ratios. I'm honestly not sure what happened with yours. By any chance, are you baking at a higher altitude or used gluten free flour?
Super easy to make! And my wife enjoyed it! Thank you so much for this recipe!
So glad to hear! And my pleasure 🙂
These are delicious! Very moist & the perfect for Valentines Day! I’d give them a rating of 10/10 if that were an option.
Aw that's the best news! And glad you enjoyed them as Valentine treat :). Thanks so much for your feedback!
Super excited to try this! Would it be easy to convert it to a simple cake recipe?
Yay! And yes, I'd say so! I think it'd work best with layers so the middle cooks easily (to help with the amount of strawberries in this recipe). Let me know how you go 🙂
These cupcakes. . . they are absolutely heavenly. And if the elderly lady endorses them. . .well. . .I'm definitely in.
Hi Lynn! Thanks so much for your kind words! I hope you enjoy the cupcakes as much as we loved them. I'm pretty sure I ate 3 before I even iced them. I hope you had a fabulous festive break xo