A delicious, from scratch, Funfetti Cupcake recipe with Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting. You don’t have to be a kid to love these fun, colorful treats!
Serve these easy Funfetti Cupcakes at your next birthday celebration. Send your guests home with some Birthday Hot Cocoa Bomb favors and you’ll be everyone’s favorite host!
Sprinkles make every thing better!
Why These Cupcakes Are Best
- Made from scratch! These have all the familiar festive color as the boxed version with a more heightened, fresh flavor you’ll love.
- Perfect for any holiday or occasion. We added cute marshmallow PEEPS to the top of each one to celebrate Easter.
- Easy to make and serve. We love cupcakes for parties and potlucks because you don’t need to worry about plates or silverware.
- The best frosting. Creamy and rich chocolate cream cheese frosting takes the sweet vanilla funfetti cupcakes to a whole ‘nother level!
Ingredient Notes
- Cake flour. The lower gluten content gives these cupcakes their fine, tender crumb.
- Buttermilk. Adds moisture and acidity to the cupcake batter with very little fat for a moist, soft cupcake.
- Vanilla. Use a pure vanilla extract for best flavor in this recipe. This homemade vanilla extract is my favorite for baked goods.
- Sprinkles. Multi colored jimmies or round “confetti” sprinkles are perfect for making funfetti cupcakes.
- Cream cheese. Make sure to use full fat cream cheese that comes in sticks for this frosting recipe.
- Chocolate syrup. A spoonful is added to the frosting along with unsweetened cocoa powder for an extra luscious chocolate flavor. Any bottled ice cream sundae syrup (like Hershey’s) can be used.
Frosting Ideas
Today, I chose chocolate cream cheese frosting for our Funfetti cupcakes.
There’s no shortage of other incredible options for frosting your homemade cupcakes! The vanilla base of funfetti cake makes it ideal for pairing with just about any kind of frosting you can imagine.
Strawberry Buttercream Frosting is full of bright berry flavor with a rosy pink color. It’s one of my favorite frostings for summertime!
If you’re in the mood for chocolate but not a fan of cream cheese frosting, top your funfetti treats with this Chocolate Buttercream Frosting instead. Or give my Chocolate Sour Cream Frosting a try instead for something a little out of the ordinary.
Can’t decide? This Chocolate Vanilla Swirl Buttercream Frosting Recipe let’s you have two flavors in one!
Tips and Tricks
- Easter dessert idea: Press a marshmallow peep on top of each frosted cupcake like we did. So adorable!
- Birthday garnishes: For birthday parties, garnish the funfetti cupcakes with more sprinkles and stick a cake candle in the center.
- Buttermilk substitute: If you don’t have buttermilk on hand, make your own with my easy buttermilk substitute recipe.
Recipe FAQs
If you don’t have cake flour, make your own with all purpose flour and cornstarch.
First, measure 2½ cups of all purpose flour into a bowl. Remove 5 tablespoons of the flour. Replace with 5 tablespoons of cornstarch. Mix well to combine, then add to the recipe in place of the cake flour.
Easy and effective!
You sure can. This batter makes enough to fill two 8 or 9 inch layer pans. You will need to increase the baking time by about 10 minutes.
I don’t recommend freezing funfetti desserts. The cupcakes will release moisture as the thaw causing the sprinkles to bleed color into the white cupcakes for a less-than-appealing appearance.
For that reason, homemade Funfetti Cupcakes should enjoyed within 3-5 days of baking.
To make this recipe as a sheet cake, follow the directions for making the batter as directed. Pour batter into a greased 9 x 13 pan. Bake at 350 degrees F until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
Funfetti Cupcakes with Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting
A delicious, from scratch, Funfetti Cupcake recipe with Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting. Add a cute PEEP on top for a fun Easter treat!
Ingredients
For the Cupcakes:
- 2 ½ cups cake flour
- 1 Tablespoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- ¾ cup unsalted butter, softened
- 1 ¾ cup granulated sugar
- 5 large egg whites, room temperature
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- ¾ cup buttermilk
- ½ cup sprinkles
For the Frosting:
- ½ cup unsalted butter, softened
- 4 ounce cream cheese, softened
- 4 cups powdered sugar
- ¼ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1 Tablespoon chocolate syrup
- 1-2 Tablespoons milk
- 30 PEEPS, for garnish, optional
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line a cupcake tin with paper liners. Set aside.
- For the cake, combine cake flour, baking powder, and kosher salt in bowl. Set aside.
- In mixing bowl, beat butter and sugar for 2 minutes on medium, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed. Beat in eggs and vanilla extract.
- Alternate additions of dry ingredients with buttermilk, mixing after each addition (about 3 of each). Once the last of the buttermilk is added, beat for one full minute.
- Fill cupcake liners two-thirds full with batter and bake for about 21-23 minutes. Remove and cool in pan 5 minutes then transfer to a wire rack. Cool completely before frosting.
- For the frosting, beat butter and cream cheese for 3-5 minutes, until fluffy. Bean in powdered sugar, cocoa powder, chocolate syrup and 1 Tbsp milk. Beat for an additional 3-5 minutes, adding more milk to get desired consistency.
- Frost cupcakes and top with a PEEP!
Nutrition Information:
Yield:
24Serving Size:
1Amount Per Serving: Calories: 348Total Fat: 13gSaturated Fat: 7gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 5gCholesterol: 31mgSodium: 140mgCarbohydrates: 57gFiber: 0gSugar: 42gProtein: 3g
*Nutrition facts are an estimate and not guaranteed to be accurate. Please see a registered dietitian for special diet advice.
These are the best easy Funfetti Cupcakes with chocolate cream cheese frosting and a PEEP on top! A hit for Easter, birthdays or any celebration.
Hey Aimee,
I made the funfetti cupcake and they fell flat, what did I do wrong. baking powder was new and also the cake flour, This is the first time is has ever happened
Every white cake I’ve tried is too crumbly! Yours looks delish and I’m sure the cake flour is the key! Can I use for a layer cake instead of cupcakes? Will it hold up? Thanks for sharing!
Yes absolutely. Here is the link: https://www.shugarysweets.com/lemon-cake-with-creamy-filling-and-lemon-curd
Funfetti Cupcakes with Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting – Shugary Sweets
I hope your server migration went smoothly overall. I had a few problems getting over here 🙂
That’s a fun funfetti cupcakes!
Happy Birthday to your daughter! I love funfetti, and those cupcakes with Peeps are too cute!
I replied to your email about the cake flour recipe – I don’t think it went through. Here it is: for every 1 cup of flour in your cake recipe, remove 2 tablespoons of the flour, and replace with 2 tablespoons of cornstarch. Easy! I haven’t bought cake flour in years…and it’s one less thing to think about for your next cake recipe.
These looks amazing, so fun 🙂 and happy birthday to your daughter!
Thanks girl for the sweet birthday wishes!
ALL of these cupcakes look amazing, but my husband (even though he is almost 30!) still thinks Fun Fetti rules. I’ll have to whip these up for an Easter treat!
Your cupcakes are always the best! 🙂
Oh, how sweet. Thank you!
Happy Birthday to your daughter! These look like wonderful birthday cupcakes.
Thanks you Regina!
omg I love love love the Peep on top. Funfetti cupcakes are already one of my favorite types of cupcakes but Peeps are my absolute fave treat ever. I get all the other holiday versions too but they don’t taste nearly as good as niblbing the head off a peep. Erm, ok a little violent but still – they’re asking for it by staring at me with all their marshmallowy goodness.
You just crack me up. Please don’t ever stop commenting over here, LOL, I love every single thing you have to say. And, the heads are the first to go 🙂
Happy Birthday to your daughter! 9 is a great age and some of my favorite memories are from that time period. I love peep on top of the chocolate cream cheese frosting!
Thanks Nicole, I agree. 9 was an awesome age 🙂
Sorry to those of you who commented and they are now gone! Lost a day’s worth of comments in my migration to a new server! thanks for your patience!