Peanut Butter Cupcakes (Cake Mix)
These delicious peanut butter cupcakes are so easy to make from cake mix. They bake up with a nice dome and we love to fill and frost them with peanut butter buttercream. (Our Peanut Butter cream cheese frosting is a great option too!)
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 (15.25) box Yellow Cake Mix We used Duncan Hines, Classic Yellow
- 1 cup granulated sugar 200g
- 1 cup All Purpose Flour 121g
- 1 cup Creamy Peanut Butter- We used Jif brand full-fat (255g)
- 1 ½ cups water 360g
- 2 teaspoons vanilla 8g
- ¼ Cup (54g) Canola Oil
- 3 whole eggs
For the Peanut Butter Buttercream (Filling & Frosting)
- *Since I used this as a filling as well I have increased our usual recipe by half
- 3 sticks (339g) unsalted butter, softened
- 1 ½ cups (382g) Creamy Peanut Butter ("All Natural" Versions have a consistency that doesn't work as well. We recommend Jif or another similar brand).
- 6 cups (690g) Confectioners Sugar
- ⅓ cup (120g) milk (Increase amount little by little as needed for desired consistency.)
- 2 teaspoons (8g) vanilla extract
- pinch of salt
Decoration
- Miniature Reese's Cups sliced in half
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line wells of cupcake pan with cupcake liners.
- Add all ingredients to mixing bowl. Mix on low speed (stand or hand mixer) for 30 seconds until incorporated.
- Increase speed to medium and mix for 2 minutes.
- Fill the cupcake liners with batter, filling them approximately ⅔-3/4 full. (About ¼ cup batter per cupcake.)
- Bake at 350 for 17 minutes or until the center springs back when lightly touched or when a toothpick can be inserted and removed with. just a few crumbs attached.
- Pop the cupcakes out of the cake pan soon after removing from the oven- we usually wait just a few minutes.
- This recipe makes about 29 cupcakes.
- For the Peanut Butter Buttercream
- In the bowl of your mixer add the butter and mix on medium speed until the butter is softened and smooth. Add the peanut butter and mix until blended.
- Gradually add the powdered sugar alternately with the milk. Add vanilla. Mix on medium speed 4 to 5 minutes until smooth.
- Filling and Frosting
- Once the cupcakes have completely cooled, it is time to fill and frost!
- For the filling: Using a disposable piping bag with the tip snipped away (or if you prefer a piping tip- a round tip 12 is a good one)- fill the bag with buttercream.
- Insert the tip of the filled piping bag into the cupcake, about halfway down, and give it a squeeze for a couple of seconds, then remove. A good test is to do this on a plate first, squeeze the bag, for 2-3 seconds to get an idea of how much frosting you are filling your cupcakes with. Then adjust to your liking. (This recipe makes 29 cupcakes and so if you have one to spare, you can slice it in half to see how much filling you are putting in.)
- Fill all of the cupcakes, then frost. Decorate however you like! I frosted my cupcakes by adding a swirl with a 2D piping tip (1M gives a very similar look). I made a circle of piping close to the outer edge of the cupcake, and then spiraled inward.
- I topped my cupcakes with miniature Reese's cups, sliced in half.
Notes
*If you do not want to fill your cupcakes, and instead will just be frosting the tops, you can use our usual peanut butter frosting recipe which makes a bit less.
Make sure to wait until the cupcakes are completely cool before adding the filling and frosting.