These red, white, and blue 4th of July cupcakes will be a huge hit at your summer party! These scratch-baked vanilla cupcakes are sweet, simple, and super fun.
The 4th of July is a day to celebrate America, and what better way than to eat lots of yummy food, including this patriotic dessert!
My 4th of July cupcakes are made from my favorite vanilla cupcake recipe. Instead of making plain white cupcakes, we’ll use food coloring to create a swirled, tie-dye effect that’s perfect for the occasion.
Cupcakes are great, but if you want to go all out, make this red, white, and blue Forth of July Layer Cake too! There’s no such thing as too much cake at a celebration.
Or make Red White And Blue M&M Cookies for the summer holiday!
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
- Easy Cupcake Decorations – The real star of these cupcakes is the multi-color cake itself, so the frosting is left simple. White cupcake frosting and some festive sprinkles are all you need.
- Fun Swirled Cupcakes– I’ll show you how easy it is to get this mixed color effect. You can try it for the fourth of July, and then use the same method for any other holiday colors you like.
- Scratch Cupcake Recipe– These cupcakes are perfectly dense with a tender crumb and lots of vanilla. They’re as good if not better than your local bakery makes!
Ingredients In 4th of July Cupcakes
These fun cupcakes are made with my favorite vanilla cupcake batter, dyed in red, white and blue for the occasion.
Complete list of ingredients and amounts can be found in the recipe card below.
- Unsalted Butter: Let the butter soften at room temperature before you start baking.
- Granulated Sugar: To make these cupcakes perfectly sweet.
- Eggs: Two large eggs, also at room temperature go into this recipe.
- Vanilla Extract: Buy pure vanilla extract, never the imitation stuff. This is the only flavoring of the cupcake, so you want it to be good.
- Yogurt: Adding yogurt to cake and cupcake recipes makes them dense and moist, like a bakery-style cupcake. You can also use sour cream if you prefer. Be sure to buy full-fat dairy to make this recipe.
- Flour, baking soda, and salt: these are the dry ingredients, common to most cupcake recipes, and probably already in your pantry.
- Buttercream Frosting: I’ll show you how to make an easy American buttercream with softened butter, powdered sugar, cream, vanilla extract, and blue food coloring.
- Sprinkles: Look for 4th of July sprinkles at the store, online, or use red and blue sprinkles mixed together.
How To Make 4th of July Cupcakes
- Get Ready to Bake: Preheat the oven to 350°F/180°C and line a muffin pan with 12 cupcake liners. Set aside while you make the batter.
- Mix the Wet Ingredients: In a large bowl, using an electric hand mixer, cream together the butter and sugar at medium speed until lighter in color and smooth. Then add the eggs, one at a time, mixing after each until it’s well-incorporated. Add the vanilla extract and yogurt, and continue to mix until incorporated. Set the bowl of wet ingredients aside.
- Mix the Dry Ingredients: In a separate medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, and salt.
- Combine Wet and Dry: Pour about one-third of the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients and mix until combined using the electric mixer. Then add the rest of the dry ingredients and the sprinkles. Mix just until everything is combined.
- Color the Batter: Separate the cake batter evenly into three small bowls. Add red food coloring to one, blue food coloring to another, and leave the last bowl white.
- Swirl: To each cupcake liner, add a scoop of each color of cake batter, making sure not to fill the cups more than ⅔ full. Use a chopstick or a butter knife to swirl the colors together to create a wavy or tie dye effect.
- Bake: Bake in the preheated oven for 20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of a cupcake comes out clean. Allow the cakes to rest and cool completely before decorating.
How to Decorate 4th of July Cupcakes
- Make Vanilla Buttercream: Cream butter in a large bowl. Slowly add the powdered sugar and beat until smooth. Add the salt, vanilla, and heavy cream, and continue blending to get a smooth frosting. Add additional cream if needed to get the right consistency for piping.
- Decorate! Place the frosting into a piping bag and use a closed star tip to pipe a spiral on top of each cupcake, starting in the center and working your way out. Sprinkle with fourth of July sprinkles if desired.
Tip!
Look for patriotic sprinkles in the grocery store or craft store during the early summer months!
Recipe Tips
- Don’t overfill. Filling the cupcake liners only halfway, and definitely no more than ⅔ of the way is key to making sure that your tie dye cupcakes don’t overflow. They aren’t as cute if they look like mushrooms!
- Measure Correctly: I have some tricks for making sure you’re measuring your ingredients correctly! When baking, it’s important to accurately measure everything to get the best results in the end.
- Use Gel Food Coloring: You’ll get the most vivid and bright colors in your baked goods using a gel-based food coloring rather than a liquid. Wilton gel food colors are my favorites. The set linked here has all of the basic colors and will last you a long time.
- Cool Cupcakes Completely: Don’t try to add buttercream to cupcakes that are still warm. It will just melt and fall right off!
- No Decorating Tips? I’m showing you exactly how to make these cupcakes using piping bags and tips, but if you’d rather, you can still make these fun cupcakes and frost them with a knife or a spatula. You can also place the frosting in a small ziplock bag and cut one of the corners off to make a make-shift piping bag for cupcakes.
- Other Decorations: You can pick up miniature toothpick flags to add to the tops of your cupcakes, or use red, white, and blue M&Ms instead of sprinkles.
Cupcake Storing Tips
Once decorated, you can store your 4th of July cupcakes in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 3 days.
Unfrosted cupcakes can be frozen, wrapped individually, for up to 3 months.
What To Serve on the 4th of July
Serve your fun and tasty 4th of July cupcakes with traditional American favorites!
Light up the Grill and make some Ground Chicken Burgers, Grilled BBQ Chicken, or Shrimp Kabobs. Beer Can Chicken is also a fun bbq meal to make.
Serve Easy Side Dishes like Tuna Pasta Salad, Ramen Noodle Salad, Shrimp Pasta Salad, or Strawberry Spinach Salad.
You’ll want to have plenty of desserts too. No Bake Pies are always great in the summer, so try my No Bake Oreo Pie, Banana Icebox Cake, or a simple No Bake Cheesecake this 4th of July.
More Cupcake Recipes
all cupcakes →
FAQs
You can! Use a white cake mix and mix it up and bake it according to the package directions. Just add in my method for dying the batter and swirling the colors together.
You can use liquid or powdered food coloring in this recipe, but you won’t get the same dark and vivid colors that you see here. Liquid food coloring tends to create more pastel hues in cake.
Sure! Experiment with different ways to combine the red, white, and blue cake batter. I like the way it looks with the three colors slightly swirled together, but you can leave them in more solid blocks if you prefer.
These cupcakes are the perfect dessert for the 4th of July! Be sure to Pin the recipe so you can make it, and be sure to make enough to share!
Did you make this? Be sure to leave a review below and tag me on Facebook, Instagram, or Pinterest!
4th of July Cupcakes
Ingredients
- ½ cup unsalted butter softened to room temperature
- ¾ cup granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs at room temperature
- 1 ½ teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- ½ cup yogurt natural or greek
- 1 ¼ cups all purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- red food coloring see note 1
- blue food coloring
Vanilla Buttercream:
- ½ cup unsalted butter softened
- 2 cups powdered sugar
- 2 tablespoons heavy cream or whole milk, or half and half
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- ⅛ teaspoon salt
Decorations:
- 2 tablespoons sprinkles
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F/180°C and line a muffin pan with 12 cupcake liners. Set aside while you make the batter.
- In a large bowl, using an electric hand mixer, cream together the butter and sugar at medium speed until lighter in color and smooth. Then add the eggs, one at a time, mixing after each until it’s well-incorporated. Add the vanilla extract and yogurt, and continue to mix until incorporated. Set the bowl of wet ingredients aside.
- In a separate medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, and salt.
- Pour about one-third of the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients and mix until combined using the electric mixer. Then add the rest of the dry ingredients and the sprinkles. Mix just until everything is combined.
- Fill the cupcake liners halfway to ⅔ full with batter. Bake in the preheated oven for 20 minutes, or until a cupcake inserted into the center of a cupcake comes out clean. Allow to rest and cool completely before decorating.
- Separate the cake batter evenly into three small bowls. Add red food coloring to one, blue food coloring to another, and leave the last bowl white. To each cupcake liner, add a scoop of each color of cake batter, making sure not to fill the cups more than ⅔ full. Use a chopstick or a butter knife to swirl the colors together.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of a cupcake comes out clean. Allow the cakes to rest and cool completely before decorating.
- Make a simple buttercream cupcake frosting by creaming butter in a large bowl. Slowly add the powdered sugar and beat until smooth. Add the salt, vanilla, and heavy cream, and continue blending to get a smooth frosting. Add additional cream if needed to get the right consistency for piping.
- Add the frosting to a piping bag fitted with a star tip. Start in the center of the cupcake and pipe a continuous spiral until you’ve covered the whole cupcake.
- If desired, top each cupcake with 4th of July sprinkles.
Notes:
- Food Coloring: The amount of coloring you’ll need will depend on the type and brand of food dye you’re using. I suggest gel food coloring. Start with 2-3 drops and add more as needed to get the color you like.
- Don’t overfill. Filling the cupcake liners only halfway, and definitely no more than ⅔ of the way is key to making sure that cupcakes don’t overflow. They aren’t as cute if they look like mushrooms!
- Measure Correctly: I have some tricks for making sure you’re measuring your ingredients correctly! When baking, it’s important to accurately measure everything to get the best results in the end.
- Cool Cupcakes Completely: Don’t try to add buttercream to cupcakes that are still warm. It will just melt and fall right off!
- No Decorating Tips? I’m showing you exactly how to make these cupcakes using piping bags and tips, but if you’d rather, you can still make these cupcakes and simply spread the icing on top.
Nutrition Information
This website provides approximate nutrition information for convenience and as a courtesy only. Nutrition data is gathered primarily from the USDA Food Composition Database, whenever available, or otherwise other online calculators.
© Little Sunny Kitchen
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