Patriotic Red, White and Blue Cupcakes

Happy Memorial Day – a day of remembering and honoring our countries heroes.

Today, we’re celebrating and reflecting with family. We are teaching our girls about our country and what red, white and blue means to us. With kids, big topics like this can be hard for them to digest, so we keep it simple and engaging.

In this case, we also made it tasty.

These red, white and blue cupcakes are simple and delicious. The cupcakes themselves are a vanilla cake dyed red. The frosting is a mix of cream cheese and whipped cream, so it’s super light and fluffy. It’s the perfect base to lay some red strawberries and blueberries on top. And of course, they’re topped with mini American flags.

These are the perfect little treats to enjoy on Memorial Day, July 4th or Labor Day. And they can easily be adapted to any other holiday, too.

Tell me, what are your traditions on Memorial Day? I’d love to hear in the comments below!

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Patriotic Red, White and Blue Cupcakes

Servings: 12 cupcakes
Time: 1 hour + cooling time
Difficulty: easy
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Ingredients

Cupcakes

1 cup plain all- purpose flour
1 1/4 tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp salt
2 large eggs, at room temp
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup unsalted butter
1/2 cup whole milk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 1/2 tsp vegetable oil
Red food coloring
Strawberries and blueberries, for decorating

Frosting

1 (8 ounce) package reduced-fat cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
2 cups heavy cream

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees for 20 minutes. Place cupcake liners in a standard muffin tin. Set aside.
Whisk flour, baking powder and salt in a large bowl. Set aside.
Place butter and milk in a heatproof jug and microwave 2 minutes on high to melt butter. Cover and leave in microwave to keep warm.
In a separate bowl, beat eggs on high speed for 30 seconds.
With the beater still going, pour the sugar in, slowly.
Beat eggs at high speed for 6 minutes, or until tripled in volume and light in color.
When the egg is whipped, add in flour mixture a little bit at a time until just mixed.
Pour hot milk, vanilla and oil into the now empty flour bowl. Add about 3/4 cups of the Egg Batter into the hot milk. Use a whisk to mix until smooth. Pour the Milk mixture into the Egg Batter and mix until just combined.
Add red food coloring until desired red color is reached (about 10-20 drops).
Pour batter into muffin tin, filling 2/3 of the way up. Bake 22 minutes or until golden and toothpick inserted into middle comes out clean.
Remove from oven. Let cool briefly; then place cupcakes on cooling rack. Cool completely before icing with frosting.
While cupcakes are cooling, make the frosting – combine the cream cheese, sugar, vanilla extract and almond extract in a large mixing bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer. Fit the mixer with the whisk attachment and mix on medium speed until smooth. While the mixture is still whipping, slowly pour in the heavy cream. Stop and scrape the bottom of the bowl a couple of times while you continue whipping until the cream can hold a stiff peak.
Frost cupcakes, decorate with fruit and enjoy!