Raspberry Pistachio Cupcakes
Raspberry Pistachio Cupcakes are moist, tender, and loaded with the bright flavor of raspberries and the buttery richness of pistachios. Even the cream cheese frosting has pistachios in it!
We love making cupcakes for special occasions, especially during the holiday season. Sweet treats like snowman cupcakes, Christmas lights cupcakes, and Christmas tree cupcakes are so sweet, and they make the season so much more cheerful.
Our raspberry pistachio cupcakes are our newest addition to our festive cupcake lineup. The flavors of raspberries and pistachios combine to make a sweet, buttery cupcake, and the color is perfect for the season.
Table of contents
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
- Basic Ingredients: These cupcakes use basic baking ingredients found in any kitchen or grocery store.
- Easy: It only takes a few simple steps and a little over 30 minutes to make these cupcakes.
- Moist and Tender: The cupcakes are so moist and tender with the perfect crumb.
- Fruity and Butter: The combination of raspberries and pistachios creates a flavor that is bright, fruity, buttery, and just a little bit savory.
- Super Festive: The red raspberries create a festive look perfect for the holidays.
Key Ingredients
We’ve made this list to help you save time on your next trip to the grocery store. You can find the full amounts needed in the printable recipe card at the bottom of the post.
- Raspberries: Raspberries give the cupcakes a bright pop of sweet, tangy, fruity flavor.
- Pistachios: Pistachios add a bit of crunch and a buttery flavor.
- Oil: Replacing part of the butter with oil makes the cupcakes even more moist and tender.
- Milk: Adding milk to the batter adds more moisture, making the cupcakes more tender.
- Cream Cheese: Full-fat cream cheese creates rich, tangy, sweet frosting.
- Powdered Sugar: Powdered sugar adds sweetness and body to the frosting.
Variations
- Berries: Use your favorite berries for these cupcakes. They all work with the pistachios.
- Sweeter: Use buttercream frosting for a sweeter variation.
- Nuts: Change the nuts to create different cupcake flavors. Each nut adds its own unique flavor to the cupcakes.
How to Make Raspberry Pistachio Cupcakes
This is a quick overview of the steps needed to make this recipe. You can find the full instructions in the recipe card at the bottom of this post.
- Beat the butter and sugar until smooth. Then, mix in the remaining wet ingredients.
- Mix the dry ingredients and mix them into the wet until combined. Then, fold in the chopped pistachios. Toss the raspberries with a bit of flour and fold them into the batter.
- Fill the muffin tins 2/3 full and bake at 350°F until the centers are set and they’re just beginning to brown.
- Transfer the cupcakes to a wire rack to cool completely.
- Beat the butter, cream cheese, vanilla, salt, and half the powdered sugar until combined.
- Add the rest of the powdered sugar and milk and beat until smooth and fluffy.
- Using a piping bag with a star tip, frost the cupcakes.
- Sprinkle with pistachio pieces and top with a raspberry. Enjoy!
Expert Tips
- Mix your cupcake batter until just combined. Overmixing the batter will create tough cupcakes.
- Fully soften the butter and cream cheese for the lightest, fluffiest frosting.
- Sift your powdered sugar to ensure the smoothest possible frosting.
- FULLY cool your cupcakes before frosting them. The frosting will begin to thin on contact if the cupcakes are even a little warm.
Raspberry Pistachio Cupcakes FAQs
Do you have questions about this recipe? Here are the answers to the most commonly asked questions.
Tough or dry cupcakes are usually the result of either using too much flour, overmixing the batter, or overbaking the batter. Be sure to loosely spoon the flour into your measuring cup and level it off with a knife. In addition, mix your batter until just combined. Finally, remove the cupcakes from the oven as soon as a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
If you don’t fully soften your butter and cream cheese, it can result in a grainy frosting texture due to small bits of raw cream cheese or butter in the frosting.
Refrigerate these cupcakes for up to 4 days in a covered container.
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📖Recipe
Want to make this recipe? Print the recipe card below, or pin this recipe, so you can find it later.
Raspberry Pistachio Cupcakes
Equipment
- large mixing bowl
- Medium mixing bowl
- Small bowl (for coating raspberries)
- Rubber spatula
- Measuring Cups and Spoons
- Kitchen scale (optional but helpful)
- cooling rack
- Piping bag
- Large star piping tip
- Scoop or spoon for filling cupcake liners
Ingredients
For the cupcakes –
- ½ cup unsalted butter softened
- 1 ⅔ cups sugar
- 6 egg whites
- 1 ¼ cups milk
- ¼ cup oil
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 2 ½ cups flour divided
- 2 ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 cup raspberries
- ½ cup pistachio pieces
For the frosting –
- 1 cup unsalted butter softened
- 8 ounces package cream cheese softened
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 4 cups powdered sugar
- ½ cup pistachio pieces
- Additional raspberries to decorate
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Spray or line standard muffin tins and set aside.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine the softened butter and sugar. Cream until smooth.
- Add in the egg whites, milk, oil and vanilla. Mix until combined, scraping the sides as needed.
- Add in 2 ¼ c flour, the baking powder and salt. Mix until smooth – stopping the machine to scrape the sides and bottom often.
- Add in the chopped pistachio pieces and fold into the batter.
- In a small bowl, gently coat the raspberries in the remaining flour.
- Add the floured raspberries to the batter and gently fold to combine.
- Divide the batter equally into the cupcake liners until they are about ⅔ full.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 14-16 minutes or until the center is set and they are just beginning to brown. Allow to cool completely before decorating.
- For the frosting – in the bowl of a stand mixer, combine the softened butter, cream cheese, vanilla, salt and about half of the powdered sugar.
- Mix on low speed until the powdered sugar is combined.
- Add in the remaining powdered sugar and mix on low until combined. Scrape the sides of the bowl.
- Bump up the speed to medium and whip the frosting for about 2-3 minutes or until smooth and fluffy.
- Transfer the frosting to a piping bag fitted with a large star tip.
- Pipe a large mound of frosting on each cupcake.
- Sprinkle with the remaining pistachio pieces and place a raspberry at the peak of each frosted cupcake.
Disclaimer
Any nutritional data I provide is an approximation and actual dietary information can vary based on ingredients and proportion sizes.
These are as pretty as they are delicious! I love that combo of pistachios and raspberries.
These were so moist and tender! I used frozen raspberries, and it worked just as well. I just defrosted them first to limit excess liquid.
These are so yummy, and I love their colorful look. I enjoyed them.
That’s what I’m talking about! I love anything with this much pistachio goodness.
Tried them yesterday and they were amazing. Soft, sweet, and the flavor combo is perfect.
Oh these are so pretty and so delicious! I love the raspberry and pistachio combination. Perfect little cake!
These raspberry pistachio cupcakes were an unexpected delight! It was a great flavor pairing and they were moist and delish!