Inside: Kids will swoon over these easy Santa cupcakes! Santa’s sweet little eyes peer over his candy nose from behind his bushy, white beard. Totally edible from start to finish and easy enough for a beginner. No fancy decorating skills required. Are you gluten-free or sugar-free? No problem! This recipe includes tweak for those diets as well!
It’s the holidays, so I’m going to deviate from my regular sugar-free content to focus on a super simple, super easy, and super fun cupcake craft your kids will absolutely devour (pun intended!).
(Want the sugar-free version? Scroll down to the end of the post to read all my Trim Healthy Mama substitutes to make this recipe a personal choice item for those who follow THM!)
Related: Healthy Santa Charcuterie Board
Making Santa Cupcakes Healthier
Those who have read my blog for very long know that my family follows the 80/20 rule. We strive to eat healthy 80 percent of the time, but we allow ourselves to eat some not-exactly-healthy treats the rest of the time.
(My family is gluten-free 100 percent of the time, but that is due to sensitivities. My kids aren’t allergic to sugar, so I do allow them to have some on occasion. As they’ve gotten older and are making more choices on their own, it’s actually more often than I care to admit!)
I’ve never seen myself as a crafty mom, but one thing I love about these Santa cupcakes is that they are just so incredibly easy. Truly, these are a breeze to make. I can leave my older kids with instructions and they can make these with my younger kids. That’s a big win for me!
Gluten-Free Options
Since my family is gluten-free, we use a gluten-free boxed cake mix for these. I am not too particular with brands. In fact, the gluten-free vanilla cake mix from ALDI is pretty tasty!
Related: Homemade Powdered Sugar
Sugar-Free & Dairy-Free Options
If you eat a sugar-free diet and really want to stay that way, then you can always use a keto cake mix. I use these from time to time, and the cakes come out pretty delicious!
Is there a way to make the other ingredients healthy-ish? Of course!
If you really want to, you can make your own frosting. For years, my girls were dairy-free along with being gluten-free, so I made all kinds of ingredients from scratch in order to avoid dairy.
Nowadays, you can purchase dairy-free cake icing, but this recipe is actually super easy to make yourself. You can also make this same frosting using butter if you don’t need to worry about being dairy-free.
(Note: It uses my homemade powdered sugar! Once you make powdered sugar for yourself, you’ll never want to buy it again!)
If you want to go sugar-free on the frosting, this recipe looks fantastic. I will say that I’ve tried the store-bought keto frosting from the same brand as the keto cake mix I use. While the cake tastes fine to me, I really don’t love the frosting. It has a cooling sensation and tastes overly sweet. If you’re trying to make the frosting in this recipe healthier, I would opt for homemade over store-bought.
Related: 16 Easy & Frugal Holiday Party Dishes
Healthier Food Coloring & Candy Options
Our family has used Indian Tree food coloring before, and we really appreciate that this brand uses natural food dyes. This would be my first option if I were to try to make the frosting in this recipe healthier!
For a healthier chocolate chip, my personal preference is Lily’s. I’ve been using Lily’s chocolates as my preferred sugar-free chocolate since I began eating the Trim Healthy Mama way many years ago. But there are many more sugar-free chocolate chip brands on the market today, so get whatever fits your family’s tastes and budget!
Now, the mini marshmallows, candy pearls, and red sanding sugar will be a little more challenging to make “healthy.”
Related: 6 Must-Make Christmas Treats
Here are some healthier candy options I found online:
ChocZero Sugar-Free Mini Marshmallows
Isolmalt Sugar-Free White Candy Pearl Substitute
MaxSweets Sugar-Free Dark Chocolate Yum Yums (use a red one for the nose!)
When it comes to the red sanding sugar, you could always just leave that off the Santa cupcakes. I think the red frosting absolutely looks like a Santa hat even without the sanding sugar.
Related: 10 Healthy Christmas Cookie Recipes
Supplies Needed to Make Trim Healthy Mama Santa Cupcakes (S)
If you want to simply make these on plan (as a personal choice) for Trim Healthy Mama, you will need the following substitutes:
Cake: keto cake mix or homemade THM vanilla cupcakes
Frosting: basic THM vanilla frosting with red Indian Tree food coloring for Santa’s hat
Mini Marshmallows: ChocZero Sugar-Free Mini Marshmallows
Chocolate Chips: Lily’s
White Candy Pearls: Isolmalt Sugar-Free White Candy Pearl Substitute
Red Candy: MaxSweets Sugar-Free Dark Chocolate Yum Yums (use a red one for the nose!)
Red Sanding Sugar: Omit
Note: The use of several processed ingredients–like the keto cake mix and candies–will make this recipe a personal choice. But using the THM-compliant ingredients will make these oh-so-much-better for you than the original recipe!
Related: Edible, Allergen-Free “Gingerbread” House
Of course, you can always make the original recipe too. I hope you and your children enjoy these super easy Santa cupcakes as much as my family!
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 box cake mix plus required ingredients like eggs, oil, and water as per the package instructions
- White frosting store-bought or homemade
- Red frosting store-bought or homemade
- Miniature marshmallows
- Red sanding sugar
- White pearl sprinkles for the beard
- 24 small red candies for the nose
- 48 chocolate chips for the eyes
Instructions
- Preheat your oven according to the instructions on the cake mix box. Line a muffin tin with cupcake liners.
- Prepare the cake batter following the instructions on the box. Typically, you’ll need to mix the cake mix with eggs, oil, and water until well combined.
- Fill the cupcake liners about two-thirds full with the cake batter. Bake the cupcakes in the preheated oven as per the package instructions. Use a toothpick to check if they’re done – it should come out clean when inserted into the center of a cupcake. Once baked, let the cupcakes cool completely on a wire rack.
- Once the cupcakes are completely cooled, spread the white frosting over half of each cupcake. Spread red frosting across the opposite half. Press the miniature marshmallows along the seam where the two colors meet.
- Over the red frosting, sprinkle red sanding sugar.
- On the white side, press two chocolate chips below the hat for the eyes. Dip the cupcake into the pearl sprinkles for the beard. Then, place the red candy for the nose.
- Allow the decorated cupcakes to set for a little while, so the decorations stay in place.
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