Easy Coconut Cupcakes with Coconut Frosting
This post may contain affiliate links. Read our disclosure policy.
Easy Coconut Cupcakes with Coconut Frosting are indulgent, smooth, and full of vacation vibes. Instead of chewy, stringy coconut shreds in your cupcake, my Coconut Cupcakes blend up the coconut first for a smooth and delicious cake base, topped with equally cool and refreshing frosting. Make these for a beachy dessert!
One hundred percent irresistible Coconut Cupcakes with Coconut Frosting! These are some of my new favorite cupcakes! Sweet and refreshing, they’re so much better than a plain old vanilla cupcake. It’s the most pleasant surprise in a cupcake!
Easy Coconut Cupcakes
I love how they don’t have pieces of the chewy coconut in them because you grind the shredded coconut in a food processor before adding it. These cupcakes are pure bliss. Everyone loved them!
I’d make these cupcakes for a pool party, luau, or when I really need to pretend I’m on a tropical vacation. You can have the option to keep the coconut unblinded, add some red berries, or add pineapple to make them Pina Colada Cupcakes! It would be especially cute to stick a fun paper umbrella toothpick in each cupcake as a decoration.
Smooth Coconut Frosting
The frosting melts in your mouth. The cupcake recipe is one I found in the Martha Stewart Cupcakes book, but I decided to add my frosting recipe. They are perfect together! I also like how the frosting recipe I used can be made in under 7 minutes, it takes maybe 3 minutes total. It will taste like fancy bakery frosting, but you can whip it up at home with no time at all. I hope you enjoy these dreamy cupcakes as much as I do!
Tropical Desserts to Try
- Coconut Cream Pie
- Pina Colada Floats
- Coconut Pineapple Thumbprint Cookies
- White Chocolate Coconut Rice Krispie Treats
- Pineapple Cake
- Banana Tres Leches Cake
Follow Cooking Classy
Coconut Cupcakes with Coconut Frosting
Ingredients
- ½ cup packed sweetened shredded coconut
- 1 ¾ cup all-purpose flour or cake flour (for a lighter cupcake)
- 2 tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp salt
- ¾ cup butter , softened (1 1/2 sticks)
- 1 1/3 cups granulated sugar
- 2 large whole eggs , at room temperature
- 2 large egg whites , at room temperature
- 1 ½ tsp vanilla extract
- ¾ cup unsweetened coconut milk
- 1 recipe Coconut Buttercream Frosting , recipe follows
- Sweetened shredded coconut , for garnish (optional)
Coconut Buttercream Frosting
- 1/2 cup butter , softened
- 4 cups powdered sugar
- 1/4 cup unsweetened coconut milk
- 1/2 - 1 tsp coconut extract or imitation coconut extract
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Pulse coconut in a food processor until finely ground. In a mixing bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt and ground coconut, set aside. With an electric hand mixer on medium high speed, cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy about 3 – 4 minutes. Add in eggs and egg whites, mixing after each addition. Stir in vanilla. With mixer on low speed, add in flour mixture alternating with coconut milk in three separate batches, mixing until combine after each addition. Divide batter evenly among 20 paper lined muffin cups, filling each cup about 2/3 full. Bake in preheated oven, rotating muffin tins once halfway through baking, until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean about 19 - 20 minutes. Allow to cool several minutes before removing from tin to cool on a wire rack. Cool completely then frost with Coconut Buttercream Frosting and garnish with additional shredded sweetened coconut if desired. Store cupcakes in an airtight container.
Coconut Buttercream Frosting
- Combine all ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Using an electric mixer, whip ingredients together until smooth and fluffy.
- Recipe Source:
- Coconut Cupcakes - Martha Stewart
- Coconut Buttercream Frosting - Cooking Classy