Easy Festive Pistachio Grinch Cupcakes Recipe

Grinch cupcakes are pistachio-flavored cupcakes decorated with green buttercream frosting and a red heart in honor of The Grinch. These moist and delicious Christmas cupcakes will be a hit any time you serve them, and you’ll love watching everyone’s hearts grow three sizes bigger with each bite of these adorable Grinch cupcakes!

During the holiday season, we always do certain things. One of our family traditions is to watch our favorite Christmas movies – and you know which one is near the top of the request list?

The Grinch Who Stole Christmas (which is probably tied for first with Elf and The Polar Express)!

And when we watch certain movies, we enjoy certain treats. For example, For The Polar Express, we always have a cup of hot chocolate when they sing the song in the movie.

When we have a Grinch movie night, we eat something Grinch-themed, but we change it up each year. In the past, I’ve made things like Grinch Popcorn, Grinch Fudge, Grinch Cake Pops, Grinch Rice Krispies Treats, and even Grinch Chocolate Covered Strawberries.

And we wash our treats down with either hot chocolate or a Grinch Punch Mocktail.

This year, I decided to make cute Grinch cupcakes! They had to be simple but delicious. And definitely green. And I wanted them to be a little different from the Grinch cupcakes you see all over the internet and Pinterest.

So I decided to flavor them with pistachio pudding to make them extra moist and tasty (and did I mention green?)!

If you’re looking for a quick and easy Grinch cupcake recipe that is quick and simple to make and tastes amazing, give these festive Grinch cupcakes a try! Even people who don’t love pistachios (my youngest son) can eat several in one sitting!

Grinch Cupcake Recipe Ingredients

• White cake mix
• Water
• Vegetable oil
• Eggs
• Pistachio pudding
• Cupcake liners

Grinch Cupcake Frosting Ingredients

• Salted butter – softened
• Powdered sugar
• French vanilla coffee creamer – could use half & half or whole milk instead
• Gel food coloring – green food coloring (and some yellow, too, depending on the shade you want)
• Red candy hearts

Helpful Kitchen Tools

• Hand mixer or stand mixer
• Piping bag and large round frosting tip

NOTE: For more recipe details, please refer to the handy printable recipe card at the bottom of this post!

How To Make Grinch Cupcakes

These easy Grinch cupcakes come together quickly and take very little effort! Just follow these step-by-step instructions.

Step 1 – Preheat Oven And Prepare Muffin Pan

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray or line standard muffin tins.

Step 2 – Mix Cupcake Batter

Add cake mix to a large mixing bowl. Using an electric hand or stand mixer, add your water, oil, and eggs to the dry ingredients and mix on medium speed until well incorporated.

Step 3 – Add Pudding Mix

Fold in the pistachio pudding mix.

Step 4 – Bake Cupcakes

Add batter into the muffin tin until each is about 2/3 full. Bake for 18-20 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool completely before frosting.

How To Make Buttercream Frosting For Grinch Cupcakes

Step 1 – Cream Butter And Add Vanilla

Using an electric mixer (handheld) or stand mixer, cream the butter, and beat until light and fluffy (about 2 minutes).

Mix in the vanilla extract.

Step 2 – Add Powdered Sugar

Slowly mix in the powdered sugar, 1 cup at a time, while adding a bit of the flavored creamer in between each cup.

Continue to mix for 1 minute or until creamy.

Step 3 – Add Food Coloring

Add food coloring to your white frosting until you reach your desired color. For the Grinch green, I just used green gel food coloring. 

NOTE: I’ve heard from some people that they mixed 4-6 drops of yellow and 2-3 drops of green. I recommend going on the slow side – add a couple of drops and see if you like the color, then add more if you think you need to – until you reach the color you want!

Step 4 – Frost Cupcakes

Prepare a piping bag and fill it with green icing. Add green buttercream frosting to each of the unfrosted cupcakes.

Step 5 – Decorate!

Add a Grinch’s heart (a large red heart sprinkle) to each one of the cupcakes.

Enjoy! When it comes to festive holiday desserts, these delicious Grinch cupcakes will spread some Christmas cheer and bring smiles to people’s faces!

Grinch Cupcakes Notes And Expert Tips

• Take care not to overmix the batter. Stop mixing once everything is combined so that your cupcakes stay soft, fluffy, and moist.

• Coloring – I mostly let the pistachio pudding add the color for the cupcakes, but I did want them a little greener for pictures, so I did add a few drops of gel food coloring.

• Regular food coloring vs. gel food coloring – regular food coloring is good for things like dying white icing. However, gel food coloring is more concentrated and has a more vibrant color, which is perfect when you want a richer shade. I recommend using gel food coloring in this recipe.

Variations To Try

• Change the cupcake flavor – The pistachio cupcakes have a delicious mild flavor, and you can totally swap out the flavor for another. Just keep the cupcakes vanilla and color them. Or make chocolate cupcakes with chocolate cake mix or red velvet cupcakes with red velvet cake mix!

• Change the pudding flavor – I used pistachio pudding because I wanted the green color for the cupcakes without using as much dye. However, you could use any pudding flavor you want. Think about it – vanilla, lemon, chocolate, cheesecake, banana cream, or coconut cream could all be amazing!

• Add extracts – If you want to make mint cupcakes, you could add a teaspoon of mint extract. Or a teaspoon of almond extract would be super yummy. Really surprise people with lemon cupcakes by eliminating the pistachio pudding and adding lemon extract.

• Change the decorations – I wanted simple and easy cupcakes, so I just did green frosting and a heart sprinkle. But you could totally take it to another level and add a Santa hat or decorate them with a Grinch face (and even Grinch eyes) like Hello Yummy did!

• Change the frosting flavor – You could add a teaspoon peppermint extract
  to the buttercream and make a delicious peppermint buttercream frosting! Or make a cream cheese frosting (perfect with red velvet cupcakes) instead of buttercream.

Grinch Cupcakes Storage Tips

If you have leftover Grinch cupcakes, you can store them in an airtight container in the fridge where they will stay fresh for about 4 days.

If you want to store them longer than that, I recommend freezing them. You can freeze the cupcakes without icing for up to 3 months. Then, when you’re ready to enjoy them, let them thaw on the counter at room temperature and simply frost or decorate them!

More Holiday Recipes You’ll Love

• Cute Hot Chocolate Cookie Cups
• Easy Shortbread Christmas Cookies
• Cranberry Orange Pound Cake
• Cheesy Christmas Tree Pull Apart Bread
• Candy Cane Cherry Danish With Cream Cheese
• Easy Strawberry Santas (Healthy Cheesecake Dessert)

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