Vegan Easter Cupcakes With Lemon Buttercream Frosting

What could be more joyful than these lovely lemon vegan Easter cupcakes with Chick Peeps inspired lemon buttercream frosting? Look at their cute, chubby faces! If you ever need a reason to smile on a not-quite-sunny spring day, you’ve only got to make a batch of these little beauties.

How do they get their sweet, bright color? No need to worry. You don’t need any artificial dyes or strange and scary ingredients. It’s turmeric! This anti-inflammatory spice from the ginger family creates the most magical color while also adding to your day’s dose of antioxidants.

Once you get your cupcakes in the oven, you’ll have plenty of time to figure out the frosting. It seems more complicated than it really is. Once you get the frosting made and placed into the piping bag, you’ll have your perfect peeps prepared.

Ingredient Notes

If you love to bake, chances are high that you already have everything you need! These classic lemon cupcakes are so simple, yet incredibly cute and delicious—using pantry staples to make them look adorable! Here’s what you need:

Soy Milk: Use soy milk for the cupcake batter or any type of dairy-free milk you prefer. Almond milk, cashew milk, and oat milk all work as well.

Lemon Zest and Juice: Infuse the cupcakes with bright, citrusy flavor by incorporating both lemon zest and lemon juice. Freshly grated lemon zest and juice are recommended for the best flavor.

Granulated and Powdered Sugar: Sweeten the cupcakes with granulated sugar, plus sweeten the frosting with powdered sugar.

Vegan Butter: You’ll use melted butter for the batter, plus more for the buttercream frosting. Buttery sticks seem to work better than vegan butter sold in tubs.

All-Purpose Flour: Use all-purpose flour as the base for the cupcake batter. If needed, you can try substituting an all-purpose gluten-free flour, though we haven’t personally tested it.

Baking Soda: This is what will help our vegan easter cupcakes rise and achieve a light and fluffy texture.

Pure Vanilla Extract: Complements the lemon well!

Turmeric: A little bit goes a long way to adding a vibrant yellow color to the frosting. It gives a great natural yellow color but you can also add vegan food coloring if you prefer. By upping the amount of turmeric, you can also achieve the perfect shade of orange frosting to pipe the beak and feet for the chickpeep decorations.

Vegan Chocolate Chips: Melt 1 tablespoon of vegan chocolate chips to create the eyes for the chickpeep decorations!

How to Make These Vegan Easter Cupcakes

For The Vegan Lemon Cupcakes

Step 1: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and line a cupcake tin with 12 cupcake liners.

Step 2: In a small bowl, combine the soy milk, lemon zest, and 1 tablespoon of lemon juice. Mix well and let it rest for 5 minutes to create a vegan buttermilk alternative.

Step 3: In a large bowl, mix the melted vegan butter and sugar until smooth. Then, add the soy milk mixture and stir to combine.

Step 4: In another bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, and salt. Add the wet mixture to the dry mixture and gently stir until combined.

Step 5: Spoon the batter evenly into the 12 cupcake liners. Bake for approximately 25 minutes at 350 degrees Fahrenheit or until a toothpick inserted into the center of a cupcake comes out clean.

Step 6: Remove from the oven and allow to cool completely before frosting.

For The Vegan Lemon Turmeric Frosting

Step 7: In a large bowl, beat the vegan butter with a hand mixer until soft.

Step 8: Gradually add the powdered sugar to the butter, blending it with the hand mixer to prevent spilling.

Step 9: Add the vanilla extract, lemon juice, and turmeric. Continue to whip until the frosting is fluffy. If the frosting is too thick, add plant-based milk, one teaspoon at a time. If it’s too thin, add more powdered sugar, ¼ cup at a time.

How to Frost Your Cupcakes

Whether you’re an old pro at piping or a complete and utter newbie, this video is really helpful as a refresher. Even if you don’t have a piping bag or any accessories, you can easily make your own. Check out this video on how to make a piping pouch using a gallon Ziploc bag.

Once you have your frosting ready to go, only a few concentrated circles are needed. Using your widest tip, hold your piping bag perpendicular to the cupcake. Start at the outer edge of the cupcake and, moving clockwise, fill the circumference with a thick layer of frosting. Release the pressure and fill in the center of the circle smoothly.

For the last layer, use the same circular motions on the cupcake, but start from the inner middle of the frosting area. Form a small mound to create the peep “head” and end with a tiny peak, if possible. Your lemon cupcakes with vegan Chick Peeps frosting are almost done!

How to Serve Up Your Sweet Chick Cupcakes

Because our lemon cupcakes with vegan Chick Peeps frosting are so adorable on their own, it’s hard to imagine that you would want to add anything else. But, if you love to be creative, you can come up with endless variations of this lovely dessert.

Change the Color

Changing the color of the frosting can turn the Chick Peeps into any character you wish. Use red for Elmo or blue for Cookie Monster. Use green for goblins (adding matcha to the buttercream works great for this) or orange for pumpkins. If you’re looking to be silly, you can even use brown for…well, you know! Anything is possible! Check out our guide to vegan food dyes for all the possibilities!

Reform the Flavor

If you’re not a huge fan of lemon, use a flavor you do like. You can make vanilla, chocolate cupcakes, or even mint cupcakes (or frosting). If you’re eliminating the lemon juice in either recipe, make sure to replace it with either water or a plant-based milk for the same amount, as well as adding a little bit of extract in your favorite flavor.

Alter the Accessories

It doesn’t need to be Easter to savor these sweet little cupcakes. You can add other delightful decorations and transform the Chick Peeps into any symbol of celebration. If you place super thin pretzel sticks into the sides of white frosting, you can make snowmen or, with the same color, use chocolate chips to make scary eyes for ghosts. Infinite possibilities await!

Double Decker

Have you ever tried adding frosting to the middle instead of to the top of your cupcake? Although it doesn’t look as cute, it makes them much easier to eat and store. When completely cool, cut the top off of the cupcake and fill with frosting. Add the top and press down gently. You could even add more frosting to the top, if you’re a huge fan.

Serve Them With These Deviled Potatoes!

If you want to go all-out on vegan Easter foods for the perfect Easter brunch, whip up a batch of these vegan deviled eggs made from potatoes! They’re delicious, fun, and easy to make.

How to Store These Vegan Lemon Buttercream Cupcakes

First of all, make sure that your vegan Easter cupcakes with lemon buttercream frosting are completely cool before storing. After taking them out of the oven, allow them to rest on a wire rack for at least an hour. If you store them while they’re still warm, the tops will become slightly soggy and sticky.

Whether frosted or unfrosted, your cupcakes will stay fresh for 3-4 days if kept at room temperature in an airtight container. If the weather is very warm and humid, or you find your frosting melting, you can place the container in the fridge.

If you wish to freeze your vegan cupcakes for future use, you must also wrap each individual cupcake in plastic wrap before placing into a sealed container. Luckily, they’ll stay fresh for about 3 months. To defrost, simply take them out of the container, take off the plastic, and let them come to room temperature before serving. (FYI, if your cupcakes are frosted, allow them to freeze uncovered for an hour first before following the steps above. That way, your frosting won’t be smashed when wrapping in plastic.)

This article about storing cupcakes is super helpful!

More Delicious Vegan Cakes to Bake

• Super Easy Vegan Birthday Cake
• Raw German Chocolate Cake
• Basic Vanilla Sponge Cake
• Protein Chocolate Mug Cake
• Perfect Vegan Ice Cream Cake
• Tastiest Vegan Carrot Cake
• Vegan Royal Icing

Vegan Easter Cupcakes with Lemon Buttercream Frosting recipe and photos by Michelle Cehn for World of Vegan. Copyright of World of Vegan™, all rights reserved.