Pina colada cupcakes with pineapple frosting
20 Apr
Earlier this week in Philly, we saw temperatures shoot up to 90. Air conditioners were turned on by some, and others pushed their ceiling fans to the limit. 90 degrees in April … say what?
So, inspired by the heat (though thankfully it’s cooled back down to upper 60s) and the desire for something fruity, I came up with a pina colada cupcake based off of an excellent cake recipe from Smitten Kitchen. The frosting is my own creation: an American buttercream (my favorite … and truly the easiest) filled with pineapple and a splash of rum–I mean, this is a pina colada cupcake right? I went with pineapple over coconut for the frosting since Ray found the cake to be very coconuty and I didn’t want to go overkill. A balanced cupcake–just like a balanced cocktail–is a good thing.
If I were to repeat these cupcakes, I’d amp up the moisture just a bit in the cake and work with the frosting a bit more…I used crushed pineapple which I then further pureed, but it held enough liquid still to make the frosting a bit difficult to manage. There’s more sugar in this frosting than what I’d normally use, but it was for stability.
Note: I did a rewrite of the recipe … see the comments section.
Ingredients
Directions
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and position the racks toward the center. Line cupcake pans with papers.
Sift the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt together. Set aside.
Whip the butter in a stand mixer until light and fluffy, then add the brown sugar and mix for 2 more minutes. Add the eggs and mix until combined.
The batter might look a bit loose, but carry on. Add the coconut cream (this is different than coconut milk ... it's much thicker and has a richer flavor) and rum. Mix until combined.
Add the dry ingredients gradually, then fold in the crushed pinepapple.
Divide batter evenly among lined cups, filling each about halfway full. Bake for about 20-22 minutes. When done, transfer tins to wire racks to cool 5 minutes; turn out cupcakes onto racks and let cool completely.
Puree the crushed pineapple with 2 tbsp of rum and 2 tbsp of pineapple juice. Use an additional tbsp of pineapple juice, if needed, to smooth out the puree.
Whip the butter until light and fluffy and add 1 cup of confectioners sugar. Mix to combine. Add the pineapple puree, then gradually add the remaining sugar until the frosting is smooth (as smooth as it's going to get ... the pineapple puree will give it more texture). This recipe makes a bit more frosting than needed, but you can freeze it for later.
Pipe the frosting on to the cooled cupcake with your favorite piping tip (I used my extra large round tip) and garnish with a chunk of pineapple. For a bit more coconut, sprinkle on some powdered coconut, which you can find in the international aisle of your grocery store.
I was sooo excited to try this recipe…frosting was too sweet & the pieces of pineapple puree tasted so dry. The cake itself is pretty good but it’s lacking flavor. My husband loved them so maybe my taste buds are more selective…lol. Can you give me any tips to fix the dry pineapple in frosting? Thanks for sharing your recipes!
Hi Dolores! Thanks so much for trying my recipe. This was a tough cupcake for me. Like I mention in the post, the frosting has more sugar in it—for stability—than I would use normally due to the extra moisture from the pineapple.
One suggestion is to look for high quality baking extracts. They are your friends
If I were to re-do these cupcakes I would do the following:
Piña colada cupcakes with pineapple frosting recipe REWRITE
Cupcake Ingredients
2 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon spiced rum
2 eggs, at room temperature
1 cup cream of coconut
1/2 cup crushed pineapple, strained, juice reserved
1-2 tsp pineapple extract
OPTIONAL: 1 tsp Rum bakery emulsion (really cool stuff that I’m just starting to work with)
Frosting Ingredients
2 sticks butter
2 tbsp rum
2 tbsp pineapple extract
2-3 cups confectioners sugar (measure it in 1/2 cup at a time and begin tasting for sweetness after 1 1/2 cups)
Then, if you wanted to do more with actual pineapple fruit, garnish it with a chunk of fresh pineapple, or have fun drying pineapple into chips and use that to garnish.
Good luck!!!
The cake of these cupcakes don’t taste even a bit like coconut!! My sister in law HATES coconut and couldn’t taste it at all. I ended up coring them out and adding pureed pineapple, maraschino cherries, and coconut flakes to it. Then made buttercream frosting with pineapple juice. Disappointed that these did not taste like pina colada.
Hi Katie,
Sorry these cupcakes didn’t do it for you. I worked with Smitten Kitchen’s original pina colada cake recipe and my husband Ray found the coconut flavor to be rather strong (for his liking). Did you use cream of coconut or coconut milk? If you used the milk, that may have been the problem (check out this link describing the difference between the 2).
Thanks for the feedback!
I did use the cream, not the milk. I appreciate the response back. I just was disappointed since it was my birthday cupcake….but I did make them pretty, I recommend a drink umbrella with a cherry to garnish them
I understand the disappointment, TRUST ME. There are Fridays when I just want to chuck the batch of cupcakes I baked because they’re not up to snuff. But for me, this is a learning process (and luckily I have less and less days like that).
I love the garnish idea! Very cute. Keep baking!