Get ready for the softest red velvet cupcakes you will ever have! These cupcakes are so moist, bursting with flavour, and are topped with the most incredible cream cheese frosting.
What makes these red velvet cupcakes so soft?
There’s a few different elements at play here, starting off with some of the ingredients:
- This recipe uses a cake flour substitute (a mixture of all purpose flour and cornstarch – cake flour is actually banned here in New Zealand which is why I can’t just use regular cake flour!). Cake flour has a lower protein content than regular flour, which results in a more tender crumb.
- Secondly, this recipe uses a combination of butter and oil. Butter adds flavour, and substituting some of it with oil really amps up the softeness! Because oil is liquid at room temperature, this resuls in a super moist cupcake.
- Thirdly, this recipe uses buttermilk. Buttermilk helps to break down the protein in the flour, resulting in a fluffier cake. It also reacts with the baking soda in this recipe, helping to leaven the batter.
Another factor is the mixing method. This recipe uses an electric mixer at first, but when it comes to folding in the dry ingredients at the end, you want to use your hands. By being ‘gentle’ with the flour, you’re going to prevent too much gluten from forming (which is great for things like bread, but we don’t want TOO MUCH gluten in a cake!).
How to make red velvet cupcakes
These cupcakes come together really easily. Begin by preheating your oven to 160°C fan forced, and line a cupcake tray with cupcake liners.
For the cupcake batter, start off by sifting together your dry ingredients. By premixing our dry ingredients, it helps ensure that everything is mixed well, preventing us from overmixing our batter when we come to combining our wet and dry ingredients.
Set your dry ingredients aside and in another bowl cream together your butter, oil and sugar for 2-3 minutes. This is going to incorporate air into our batter which will give us a fluffier cupcake!
Next add in your eggs one by one, mixing well in between each addition. Eggs add structure and moisture to our cupcake.
Next add in the vanilla, white vinegar and red liquid food colouring and mix until well combined.
Now the last step is to fold in our dry ingredients while alternating with our buttermilk. So to do this, add in half of your dry ingredients and fold it into the wet mixture until just combined. Then add in your buttermilk, and fold that through until just combined. Lastly, add in your remaining dry ingredients and fold through until just combined.
It’s important to do this step by hand as this will prevent us from overmixing our batter and developing too much gluten. Gluten is what gives bread great structure, and although we want SOME structure for our cupcakes, we don’t want too much otherwise it’ll make our cupcakes tough and dense.
Once the batter is done, evenly distribute it into the cupcake liners (fill them about 1/2 way up – don’t overfill) and bake for 18 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean.
Once done, let them cool in the cupcake tray for 10-15 minutes, and then place them on a wire rack to completely cool. In the meantime prepare your cream cheese buttercream.
How to make cream cheese buttercream
This cream cheese frosting comes together SO EASILY! It’s a small batch of my regular cream cheese buttercream recipe. For additional tips and information, refer to that blog post 🙂
You want to start off by creaming your butter for a few minutes until it’s light and fluffy. This is going to give your frosting a lighter texture.
Next you want to add in your icing/confectioners sugar in 3 batches, whilst mixing on a low speed. This is going to ensure that our icing sugar doesn’t go everywhere!
Then add in your cold cream cheese, vanilla essence/extract and fresh lemon juice. Mix on a medium high speed just until the frosting is smooth. Avoid over-mixing as this can result in a less stable frosting.
And that is it! You should end up with an incredibly delicious, not-too-sweet cream cheese buttercream.
How to frost your cupcakes
You can get creative and frost your cupcakes however you like! I frosted mine with a 1M piping tip. I started by cutting the tip of a piping bag and placing my piping tip in it.
I then folded the piping big over onto my hand and filled it with my cream cheese buttercream.
I then piped a cupcake swirl on the cupcake. To do this, start on one edge of the cupcake, go around and then slowly bring the piping bag into the middle of the cupcake as you keep piping, until the cupcake is fully covered. It’s a little hard to explain, but I have a great beginners piping tutorial you can check out on YouTube, as well as a 1M cupcake piping tutorial for more ideas 🙂
And that is it! You’re left with beautiful red velvet cupcakes ready to eat! 🙂
Soft Red Velvet Cupcakes
Print Pin VideoIMPORTANT: For accuracy, I would recommend using the gram measurements provided, as those are the exact quantities I use. Cup measurements are given as estimates (based on US cup measurements) to make it easier for those who do not have a scale.
Ingredients
Red Velvet Cupcakes
- 1¼ cups (150 g) flour - regular, all purpose (see note 1 if you want to use cake flour)
- 1½ tbsp (9 g) cornflour - also known as cornstarch
- 1½ tbsp (7 g) cocoa powder - unsweetened
- ¼ tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp baking powder
- ¼ tsp salt - omit if using salted butter
- 3 tbsp (43 g) unsalted butter - room temperature
- ⅓ cup (70 g) unflavoured vegetable oil - I use canola
- 1 cup (200 g) white sugar
- 2 large eggs - room temperature
- ½ tbsp vanilla essence/extract
- ¾ tsp white vinegar
- 1¾ tbsp red liquid food colour
- ⅓ cup (75 g) buttermilk - room temperature
Cream Cheese Buttercream
- ½ cup (112 g) unsalted butter - room temperature
- 2¼ cups (285 g) icing sugar - also known as confectioners/powdered sugar
- ¾ cup (168 g) cream cheese - cold, firm type (see note 2)
- ¾ tsp vanilla essence/extract
- ¾ tbsp lemon juice - must be fresh
Instructions
Red Velvet Cupcakes
- Preheat oven to 160 °C (320°F) with the fan on (see note 6 if you don't have a fan function) and line a cupcake tray with cupcake liners.
- In a bowl, sift together your flour, cornflour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Using a whisk or fork, mix until well combined. Set aside.
- In another bowl, add in your butter, vegetable oil and sugar. Using an electric mixer (hand or stand mixer are both fine - see note 3), cream together for 2-3 minutes until light and creamy.
- Add in eggs one by one, mixing well in between each addition (about 10-15 seconds between eggs).
- Add in your vanilla, vinegar and red liquid food colour, and mix until well combined. Now set your mixer aside as the remainder of the batter will be finished by hand.
- Finish off by adding in half of your premixed dry ingredients to your wet mixture, and gently fold it in with a spatula until just combined. Then add in all of your buttermilk, and fold it in until just combined. Lastly, add in the remaining dry ingredients and gently fold it into the mixture until just combined. Do not overmix (see note 4).
- Distribute the batter evenly into the cupcake liners (only fill about 1/2 way up), and bake for 18 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Avoid overbaking the cupcakes otherwise they will dry out.
- Once baked, allow them to cool in the cupcake tin for about 10-15 minutes, and then place them onto a wire rack to completely cool. In the meantime prepare the cream cheese buttercream.
Cream Cheese Buttercream
- Cream your butter for a few minutes until it's light and fluffy. Either use a hand mixer or stand mixer on a medium high speed. If using a stand mixer, use the paddle attachment.
- Add in the icing sugar in 3 batches while mixing on low. Ensure that each batch of icing sugar is mixed into the butter well before adding in the next batch.
- Next add in your cold cream cheese, vanilla and fresh lemon juice. Mix just until the frosting is smooth. Avoid over-mixing (see note 5).
- Once the cupcakes are completely cool, frost with the cream cheese buttercream. I used a 1M piping tip to pipe my frosting. See blog post above or recipe video below to see how I did this 🙂
Video
Notes
Nutrition
Nutritional information are estimates only as they are automatically calculated by a third party application. Actual values may differ based on brands and types of products used.
115 Comments
Amazing! I made these last night for a dinner party, and everyone thought they were from a bakery. My only feedback is this takes a lot longer than 10 minutes to prep. It took me a good 2 hours to get everything done (including the baking) so plan to a lot a bit of time, but it is worth it. I also doubled the frosting so that I could use more frosting on each cupcake. My only questions is can these be made with chocolate chips next time? If yes, how would the recipe be altered. And, as Red Dye is now illegal to sell in California, is there a substitute to use? I can’t wait to try more of your recipes.
So glad you loved the recipe Erin 😀
Yes you could totally fold some chocolate chips in at the end without needing to alter the recipe. In terms of the red dye i’m not too sure sorry! Perhaps using a natural dye like one made out of beetroot? Although the color may not be as concentrated. So sorry I couldn’t be of more help on that front!
Any substitute for buttermilk? Are you referring to original buttermilk, which we yield during churning process of butter from curd?
Please clarify.
And, can I use ACV instead of white vinegar?
I tried your Fruit Cake, it was awesome.. my family liked it.. thank you so much for these recipes.
Also, try adding sourdough bread and pancakes recipe..
Thanks in advance.
Hi Aafiyaa! 🙂
So the buttermilk used in this recipe is a store-bought one which has acid added to it, making it slightly different to real homemade buttermilk. You can use a homemade buttermilk substitute which you can find here: https://cakesbymk.com/recipe/how-to-make-buttermilk/
I haven’t tried with ACV myself, so not too sure how that would affect the taste of the cake sorry! Because it is a small amount it should be okay, but just can’t say for sure.
So so happy to hear you and your family loved the fruit cake Aafiyaa 😀
Would love to experiment with sourdough in the future 🙂
Thanks for responding! 🙂
Quick questions. Your recipe measures liquids in grams as well. Is this correct or do you mean ml ? For instance the oil and buttermilk …
Thank you.
Hi Sophie! Grams is correct 🙂
Simply use the ‘gram’ function on your scale to measure the liquids 🙂
Hope that helps and hope you enjoy the recipe!
Could I use Margarine instead of butter?
Hi Sam! Though margarine may work, I would highly recommend using real butter for the best taste and texture. Hope that helps and hope you enjoy the recipe 🙂
Hi MK,
Thank you for this lovely recipe.
Can I ask what the metric equivalent would be for the buttermilk as you give it in a cup measurement and I’m not sure how to convert to mls or grams.
Thanks so much
Jude
Hi Jude! 🙂 Ahh yes I am not too sure why I didn’t have it there in this recipe – I’ll update this now! It will be 75g 🙂
Hope you enjoy the recipe!
Thank you so much, that’s perfect 😊
Hey MK!!! Thank you for another keepers recipe!
You write that the cream cheese has to be of the firm type. Not sure that we have that in Germany. We just have one type of cream cheese (and I guess it is the spreadable one). And ideas how I can adapt the frosting recipe?
Regards
Hi Anastasia! 🙂 So with the cream cheese, here in NZ we get ‘original’ cream cheese which is quite firm and then a ‘spreadable’ version which is a bit softer. The original version is technically still spreadable, but is quite firm (a bit softer than say cold butter). If there is only one type in Germany then you could try to use it and see how it goes 🙂 you could add more powdered sugar if you find the frosting is a bit too soft, but keep in mind it will make the frosting sweeter. A bit of cornstarch can also help to thicken the frosting. Hope that helps 🙂
May I ask what size cupcake liners you use? I have the tall standard cupcake liners they are 2 x 1-3/4. Would this recipe work well with them or would I need to double the recipe?
Thank you so much.
Hi Pam! 🙂 I believe for this recipe I use the same size cupcake liners as you (they come up a little higher than the cupcake tin) so 1x the recipe should be enough. Hope that helps and hope you enjoy the recipe 🙂
OMG, I have never tasted better red velvet. I made some of these to take to work (amongst some more of your recipies) as I was leaving/retiring. Simple and straightforward to make but so light and fluffy. So many lovely comments about how light and tasty they were. These will definitely be a go to make. You are a genius.
Thank you so much for the wonderful feedback Alison! So so happy to hear you and your colleagues enjoyed the recipes 😀
Can we use lemon juice instead of white vinegar?
Hi Aduke! 🙂 I haven’t tried that myself and although it may still achieve the required effect (as it is acidic like vinegar), it may alter the taste of the batter (I’m not sure if it will interact as well with the other flavors). I would recommend sticking to the vinegar if possible 🙂
Always a hit! I was so confident that this red velvet recipe would also be perfect like all your other ones mash ALLAH and these were honestly the best red velvet cupcakes I’ve made to date!
Thank you so much, you are my go to in all my baking troubles 🙂
May God bless you!
I think these are the best cupcakes I’ve ever had
Aww yay! This comment made my day! So glad to hear you loved them Charlotte 😀