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Strawberry crunch cupcakes.
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5 from 5 votes

The BEST Stawberry Crunch Cupcakes (VIDEO)

This easy recipe for moist homemade Strawberry Crunch Cupcakes is going to become your new favorite! Flavorful vanilla cupcakes with a simple cream cheese frosting and a yummy, fruity strawberry crunch topping.
Prep Time30 minutes
Cook Time25 minutes
Total Time55 minutes
Course: Dessert
Cuisine: American
Servings: 6 Large
Calories: 664kcal
Author: Katalin Nagy

Ingredients

Cupcakes

  • 110 g Unsalted butter soft, room temperature
  • 110 g Granulated sugar
  • 1 Egg room temperature
  • 130 g All purpose flour
  • ¼ teaspoon Salt
  • ½ teaspoon Baking powder
  • 135 g Whole milk room temperature
  • 2 teaspoon Vanilla extract
  • ½ teaspoon White vinegar
  • ½ teaspoon Baking soda
  • Pink food coloring high quality concentrated gel, or powder

Cream Cheese Frosting

  • 120 g Mascarpone high fat
  • 65 g Icing sugar sifted
  • 226 g Cream cheese high fat

Strawberry Crunch

  • 85 g Golden Oreos
  • 9 g Freeze dried strawberry
  • Small pinch of salt
  • 14 g Unsalted butter Melted but not hot. Butter is needed to create the bigger chunks, can be left out if aiming for a more crumble texture

Instructions

Vanilla cupcakes

  • Heat oven to 175 C / 347°F no fan
  • With an electric hand mixer, whip room temperature soft butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy then beat the egg in. Do not overbeat
  • Mix pink food coloring and vanilla into room temperature milk
  • Sift flour, salt, and baking powder together, this is the “dry ingredients”, while the milk mixture is your "wet ingredients"
  • Start adding the dry and wet ingredients into the cupcake batter in the following 4 steps: wet, dry, wet, dry. Fold with a Rubber spatula and fold each time. Finish with dry ingredients
  • Mix vinegar and baking soda together in a small bowl, it will be super bubbly. Immediately fold the mixture into the cupcake batter. This is the secret ingredient to keep the cupcakes soft for days without the taste of vinegar of course!
  • Spoon or pipe the mixture into the cupcake pan till approx. ¾. This recipe makes 6 large cupcakes
  • Bake for 25 min or until a skewer inserted comes out clean then let them cool on Cooling rack

Cream Cheese Frosting

  • For the frosting, whip mascarpone, cream cheese, and powdered sugar until smooth and fluffy, about one or two minutes with an electric hand mixer. Once it has reached the right consistency, do not overbeat it as it can become runny.

Strawberry Crunch

  • Start with the melting butter in the microwave, then let it cool slightly while preparing the crumbs
  • The Crumble can be made either in a food processor, or in a ziplock bag beating it with a rolling pin until the cookies and strawberries are evenly broken up not leaving any big chunks
  • Then, add a good pinch of salt to balance the sweetness. Add melted but not hot butter to the mixture.
  • Once the crumble is placed in the fridge the butter cools off and acts as a binding agent creating bigger chunks. Use a plate or sheet pan to spread the crumble out before placing it in the fridge to set

Assemble

  • Pipe frosting on top of the cupcakes one by one
  • Gently dip each frosted cupcake upside down into the strawberry crunch to fully coat
  • Sprinkle each cupcake with even more crunchy strawberry crumble and then decorate with fresh strawberries and crushed Golden Oreos
  • Server the cupcakes while they are fresh. Any leftover can be stored in the fridge for 1-2 days

Video

Notes

INGREDIENT NOTES:
  1. Measure your ingredients with a Digital scale for accuracy
  2. All ingredients for the cupcake must be at room temperature to properly emulsify: eggs, milk, etc.
  3. Use high-quality concentrated gel food coloring (or powder, if you can access it). Liquid food coloring tends to fade during baking
  4. Do not skip the white vinegar+baking soda "secret ingredient":)
  5. For the frosting, make sure you use high-fat content cream cheese and mascarpone. Low-fat dairy products won´t whip up properly
TECHNIQUE NOTES:
  1. Make sure you read my Expert tips section above to maximize your success. A short recipe alone is not able to cover all the necessary details, and science behind baking. 
  2.  While whipping the cream cheese frosting, pay very close attention to the consistency and stop whipping immediately after it gets fluffy. Overbeating would result in breaking the cream and instead of becoming stiffer, in fact, it will get runnier
  3. Never frost warm cupcakes, make sure they are chilled to room temperature
  4. Be careful not to break down the cookies and freeze-dried strawberries too much. You want the texture to be crumbly not like dust
  5. Check whether the frosting is stable enough before proceeding with dipping it into the crunch

Nutrition

Calories: 664kcal | Carbohydrates: 61g | Protein: 8g | Fat: 43g | Saturated Fat: 25g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 3g | Monounsaturated Fat: 9g | Trans Fat: 1g | Cholesterol: 132mg | Sodium: 430mg | Potassium: 157mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 38g | Vitamin A: 1378IU | Vitamin C: 18mg | Calcium: 129mg | Iron: 2mg