Beautiful squishy green velvet chocolate cupcakes with rich vanilla-flavored cream cheese frosting made in less than 40 minutes – perfect for St Patrick’s Day celebration.
My secret tip to make the softest, moist cupcakes is to add white vinegar to the batter, it will help activate the baking soda and produce the fluffiest crumb.
Gina’s Recipe Rundown:
Texture: Fluffy texture, moist crumb, and super rich buttery frosting.
Taste: Green velvet cupcakes have a flavor full of chocolate, vanilla, cream cheese, and butter notes.
Ease: Although it is a make-from-scratch recipe, it only uses simple ingredients and steps, no chilling is required. Very beginner- and kid-friendly.
Why I love it: they are fun, easy to make, and irresistible! Honestly, it will be a great dessert any time of the year.
For St Patrick’s Day dessert board, you can also make some of my delicious recipes: Lucky charms treats, Lush dessert, rainbow cake, cake mix cookie bars, mint chocolate chip cookies, or shamrock M&M’s popcorn.
What Is Green Velvet?
Green velvet cupcakes and cakes have just the same taste as traditional red velvet cake, are made with vanilla extract, cocoa powder, and added frosting, but green velvet uses green food coloring instead of red one. That’s the whole difference.
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
- A nice big batch of cute St Patrick’s day cupcakes – the recipe makes 24 regular size cupcakes
- So much fun to make with kiddos! They absolutely love these!
- Absolutely delicious cupcakes all made with staple ingredients and completely from scratch.
Ingredients Notes
Cupcakes
- Flour mixture: all-purpose flour, baking soda, and salt.
- Granulated sugar adds sweetness but also traps moisture.
- Cocoa powder. I add just a little bit – the cupcakes will still be bright green, but also have a nice chocolatey flavor just like classic red velvet cupcakes. Go for unsweetened cocoa powder.
- Eggs and Vegetable oil. Bind everything together and make sure the cupcakes are tall and pretty.
- Buttermilk. Store-bought or homemade (with regular milk and lemon juice). Full fat buttermilk as its fat content is very important for these cupcakes.
- White vinegar to activate the baking soda and make tender cupcakes. Not to worry, you won’t taste it.
- Vanilla extract. Pure vanilla extract is best in baking.
- Green food coloring to make green cupcakes. You can safely use green gel food coloring or liquid food coloring of your favorite brand. Americolor is a great option and with gel coloring you only need a teaspoon, while with liquid coloring you may have to dump the whole bottle to get a nice dark green.
Cream Cheese Frosting
- Cream cheese, softened. Use full fat cream cheese for the best results.
- Unsalted butter, softened
- Vanilla extract.
- Confectioner’s sugar or powdered sugar.
Kitchen Equipment
- Cupcake liners
- Cupcake tin (several) or muffin tins
- Mixing bowl
- Electric mixer or stand mixer
- Optional, cookie scoop
- Optional, piping bag
How To Make Green Velvet Cupcakes
1: Make Cupcake Batter
- Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).
- Line the cupcake pans with liners. Set aside.
- Whisk the dry ingredients: flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl.
- Combine the wet ingredients: eggs, oil, buttermilk, vinegar, vanilla, and green food coloring in a separate medium-sized bowl – whisking until smooth. The batter should be evenly bright green.
- Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients, stirring until just combined. Don’t over-mix.
2: Bake Cupcakes
- Portion out the batter into the prepared pan, filling each liner about ¾ full with cake batter. You can pour or scoop batter.
- Bake for 18-20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
- Allow the cupcakes to rest for 5 minutes in the tin and then cool completely on the wire rack before frosting.
3: Make Frosting
- Beat softened cream cheese and softened butter together in the mixing bowl until smooth and creamy.
- Stir in the vanilla.
- Slowly add the confectioner’s sugar, beating until fully combined. You can adjust the amount of sugar to get the consistency you want.
- Decorate the cupcakes as desired. This frosting can be piped or spread on – it will hold its shape if kept cool.
Storage
Store leftover cupcakes at room temperature in an airtight container for 2-3 days once they cool completely. Frosted cupcakes can be refrigerated for 3-4 days. Let them warm to room temperature for about 30 minutes before serving.
You can freeze unfrosted cupcakes for up to 3 months. To freeze frosted cupcakes, first blast freeze them until hard on the baking sheet, then tightly wrap each cupcake, transfer to a freezer-safe bag and store in the freezer for up to 2 months.
To make ahead, bake cupcakes and make frosting 2 days in advance, refrigerate separately, and assemble when ready to serve.
Substitution & Variations
- Cupcakes. You can also use cake flour for softer cupcakes and less gluten, or self-rising flour to skip baking soda or powder. You can also use cake mix as a shortcut.
- Frosting. Swap cream cheese frosting with buttercream frosting, it can also be dyed green, Bailey’s Irish Cream buttercream frosting, marshmallow frosting, white chocolate frosting (requires cooking), or simply piped heavy whipping cream.
- Decorations: use gold sanding sugar, edible golden coin, shamrock sprinkles, white, green, gold sprinkles, or festive cupcake toppers. Change the decorations and these green velvet cupcakes can easily work for Christmas too!
- Use Greek yogurt or sour cream in the batter too. It will add a little tang and make a soft and tender crumb too.
- Make the whole green velvet cake or mini cupcakes instead.
- Simply swap the green food coloring with red to make the red velvet cake or cupcakes.
Expert Tips To Make The Best Green Velvet Cupcakes
- Take butter and cream cheese out of the fridge 30-45 minutes before making the cupcakes to let them soften at room temperature.
- I don’t add baking powder, but it can also help to make fluffy cupcakes. It will also make them rise so don’t fill the cupcake liners too much or the batter will overflow.
- Alternative way to make the frosting. Beat butter on medium high speed for just about 5 minutes. It should be fluffy and not stiff. Then you add cream cheese and beat again just until smooth. Lastly, you beat in sugar until you have the right consistency.
- To make the frosting faster, you can cube both cream cheese and butter.
Popular Questions
What Is The Secret To Super Moist Cupcakes?
The secret to making super moist cupcakes lies in the ingredients and how you mix them. One key ingredient is buttermilk, which adds moisture and a slight tangy flavor and works in cupcakes much better than regular milk.
Another important ingredient is oil, which helps keep the cupcakes soft and tender. Using the right amount of sugar also helps, as it locks in moisture during baking. Brown sugar always adds some moisture and chewiness too.
Another trick is to be gentle when mixing the batter. Over-mixing or adding too much flour can make the cupcakes tough because it develops too much gluten in the flour.
My personal tip is to add a bit of white vinegar, which helps activate the baking soda, making the cupcakes rise nicely and stay moist.
If you love this easy cupcake recipe, you’re going to love these other St. Patrick’s Day treats too. Please click each link below to find the easy, printable recipe!
More Cupcakes You’ll Love
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Green Velvet Cupcakes
Ingredients
Cupcakes
- 2 ½ cups all-purpose flour
- 1 ¼ cups granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 tablespoon cocoa powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 large eggs
- 1 cup vegetable oil
- 1 cup buttermilk
- 1 tablespoon white vinegar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 ½ teaspoons green food coloring
Cream Cheese Frosting
- 8 ounces cream cheese softened
- ½ cup butter unsalted – softened
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 4 cups confectioner’s sugar one – 32oz bag
Instructions
Cupcakes
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
- Line the cupcake pans with liners. Set aside.
- Whisk the flour, sugar, baking soda, cocoa powder, and salt in a large bowl.
- Combine the eggs, oil, buttermilk, vinegar, vanilla, and green food coloring in a separate bowl – whisking until smooth.
- Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients, stirring until just combined. Don’t over-mix.
- Portion out the batter into the prepared pan, filling each liner about ¾ full.
- Bake for 18-20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
- Allow the cupcakes to cool completely before frosting.
Frosting
- Beat the cream cheese and butter together in the mixing bowl until smooth and creamy.
- Stir in the vanilla.
- Slowly add the confectioner’s sugar, beating until fully combined.
- Decorate the cupcakes as desired. This frosting can be piped or spread on – it will hold it’s shape if kept cool.
Nutrition
Nutritional information for the recipe is provided as a courtesy and is approximate. Please double-check with your own dietary calculator for the best accuracy. We at Yummi Haus cannot guarantee the accuracy of the nutritional information given for any recipe on this site.
Created by Gina Kleinworth
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