Turkey Cupcakes – Life Love and Sugar

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These Turkey Cupcakes are vanilla cupcakes frosted with enjoyable, colourful buttercream within the form of a turkey! They’re simpler to make than they appear and so festive for Fall and Thanksgiving!

Why You’ll Love These Turkey Cupcakes

Colourful, festive and cute – what’s to not love?! These cupcakes are positive to get a lot of “oohs” and “aahs” as you break them out to serve them. As a bonus, they style nice too!

  • Enjoyable and festive – These turkey cupcakes are good for this time of 12 months. Proper on theme! They’d be nice for a youngsters get together, Fall gathering or Thanksgiving.
  • Scrumptious cupcakes – Cute AND tasty! These vanilla cupcakes are my selfmade vanilla cupcakes with a contact extra oil for additional moisture. So yummy!
  • Straightforward to make – Not solely is the cupcake straightforward to place collectively, however so is the adorning. You simply want just a few piping suggestions and just a little persistence to make some cute turkeys. Take a look at the step-by-step photos beneath for steerage.
  • Customizable – I used a vanilla cupcake for the bottom, however you may simply change it up with chocolate cupcakes, pumpkin cupcakes, and even cinnamon sugar swirl cupcakes.

Ingredients for turkey cupcakes on marble countertop

What You’ll Want

These turkey cupcakes simply require some pantry staples and a handful of adorning objects and also you’ll be in your solution to some cute cupcakes. Scroll all the way down to the recipe card beneath for the measurements.

For the cupcakes

  • All-purpose flour – Be sure you measure it precisely, so that you don’t find yourself with dry cupcakes. I at all times advocate a food scale. Alternatively, you should utilize the spoon and stage technique.
  • Baking powder – For rise and good texture.
  • Salt – To carry out taste.
  • Butter – Unsalted butter at room temperature is greatest. You can use salted butter, however you’d wish to miss some or all the added salt.
  • Vegetable oil – The mix of butter and oil offers the cupcakes nice texture and moisture.
  • Sugar
  • Vanilla extract
  • Eggs – You need giant eggs, not medium or additional giant.
  • Milk – Entire milk or 2% milk.

For the buttercream

  • Unsalted butter – This needs to be at room temperature in order that every little thing combines nicely.
  • Powdered sugar – The powdered sugar provides quantity and stability to the buttercream. You may cut back the quantity, however you might not find yourself with sufficient buttercream and it will not be stiff sufficient for piping.
  • Vanilla extract
  • Heavy whipping cream
  • Salt – You don’t have so as to add salt, nevertheless it cuts down the sweetness a bit and provides taste.
  • Cocoa powder – I like to recommend pure unsweetened cocoa powder. A darker cocoa can be just a little too darkish right here.
  • Gel icing color – You’ll want 4 colours – yellow, orange, crimson and black. The gel colours are extra concentrated, so that you don’t want as a lot to get a deeper shade.

For Adorning

  • Two Wilton 104 tips – These are used for the crimson and orange “feathers”. You can get away with only one, nevertheless it’s handy to have two and never have to scrub between makes use of. Both method works although!
  • Wilton 102 tip – The marginally smaller tip is for the yellow “feathers”. You’re working with much less area, so the smaller tip is matches just a little higher.
  • Ateco 808 tip – A big spherical tip is good for creating the turkey physique.
  • Wilton 4 tip and Wilton 5 tip – I used tip 4 for the eyes and tip 5 for the beak. You can use the identical one for each, however I do just like the distinction in dimension, when you have them each helpful.
  • Piping bags – There are many choices on the market and you’ll often discover them in shops like Walmart, Michaels and Interest Foyer. I have a tendency to make use of Wilton model. I discover that off model luggage on Amazon aren’t fairly as sturdy.
  • Couplers – Once more, I have a tendency to make use of Wilton, however you’ll be able to definitely attempt one other model. You may often discover these in retailer.
turkey cupcakes on marble countertop

How To Make Turkey Cupcakes

These cupcakes aren’t laborious to make, however a visible at all times helps. Right here’s some step-by-step photographs of the method. You could find the printable model of the directions within the recipe card beneath.

Make the cupcakes

  • Prep: Preheat oven to 350°F and prep a cupcake pan with liners. Mix the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a bowl and put aside.
  • Mix moist elements: Beat the butter, sugar, oil and vanilla extract in a big mixer bowl till gentle in shade and fluffy, about 2-3 minutes. Add the eggs one by one, mixing till nicely mixed after every.
  • Add dry elements: Add half of the dry elements to the batter and blend till principally mixed. Add the milk and blend till nicely mixed. Add the remaining dry elements and blend till nicely mixed and easy.
  • Bake: Fill the cupcake liners about 3/4 full and bake for 15-18 minutes or till a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clear. Take away cupcakes from the oven and place on a cooling rack to chill.

Make the buttercream

  • Mix buttercream elements: Beat the butter till easy and creamy. Add half of the powdered sugar and blend till nicely mixed. Add the vanilla extract, 1 tablespoon of heavy cream and salt and blend till nicely mixed and easy. Add the remaining powdered sugar and beat till nicely mixed. Add further heavy cream as wanted to get the suitable consistency.
  • Colour the buttercream: Take away about 1 cup of buttercream and add to a different bowl. Add the cocoa powder and three tablespoons of heavy cream combine till nicely mixed. Divide the remaining vanilla buttercream between three bowls. Colour the most important quantity of frosting crimson, the smallest quantity yellow and the opposite frosting needs to be orange.
  • Prep for adorning: Add the crimson and orange frosting to a piping bag fitted with the Wilton 104 tip and add the yellow frosting to a piping bag fitted with the Wilton 102 tip.

Embellish the cupcakes

  • Add crimson feathers: Begin with the crimson “feathers” across the exterior of the cupcake. The bigger finish of the piping tip needs to be virtually touching the cupcake, however not fairly. Create the ruffle “feathers” by shifting the piping tip in the direction of the surface of the cupcake, then in the direction of the middle in small up/down actions that create a ruffle or wave-like design across the periphery.
two images together - one of piping on the red ruffles and one of the finished ruffles
  • Add orange and yellow feathers: Repeat the identical step with the orange after which the yellow, shifting inward for every shade so as to see the one behind it.
two images together - one of piping on the orange ruffles and one of the finished ruffles
two images together - one of piping on the yellow ruffles and one of the finished ruffles
  • Make the turkey physique: Add the chocolate buttercream to a piping bag fitted with the Ateco 808 tip, or one other giant spherical piping tip. Pipe one steady physique and head. You’ll add just a little extra strain for the massive a part of the physique to make it bigger.
  • Make the turkey face: Add just a little little bit of leftover chocolate buttercream to a small bowl and shade it with black gel icing shade. Add the black frosting to a piping bag with a small spherical tip, I used Wilton tip 4, and pipe on the eyes. Add among the remaining orange frosting to a piping bag fitted with one other small spherical tip, I used Wilton tip 5, and pipe on just a little triangle for the beak.
two images together - one of piping on the body and one of the finished turkey with eyes and beak added

Ideas For Success

  • Measure flour rigorously. An excessive amount of flour will lead to a dry cupcake. To measure precisely, I like to recommend utilizing a food scale, however you can even use the spoon and stage technique in the event you don’t have one. Learn extra about measuring flour precisely right here.
  • Don’t skimp on creaming time. When creaming collectively the butter, oil and sugar, accomplish that till the combination has considerably lightened in shade and change into fluffy. This course of incorporates air into the batter which helps forestall an excessively dense cupcake.
  • Buttercream consistency. The buttercream makes use of 5 ½ cups of powdered sugar. You may add much less powdered sugar to the frosting in order that there isn’t a lot sugar, however you received’t find yourself with as a lot frosting and it received’t be as thick. You want it thick sufficient for the piping to remain in place. I extremely advocate utilizing the total quantity of powdered sugar.
  • Piping luggage. In case you don’t have a small spherical piping tip simply, you can even trim the tip off a piping bag or the nook off a Ziplock bag.
turkey cupcakes on wooden board with leaf sprinkles around

How one can Retailer Turkey Cupcakes

Retailer the cupcakes in an hermetic cupcake carrier or in a single layer in an hermetic container tall sufficient to accommodate the frosting. You may retailer them at room temperature for as much as 24 hours, within the fridge for as much as 4 days, or within the freezer for as much as 3 months. They’re greatest loved at room temperature so allow them to sit on the counter for a bit earlier than biting in.

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close up of turkey cupcakes on marble countertop