Valentine’d Day tends to get a little girly with all the Red Velvet Cupcakes and other Red Velvet Treats but don’t forget about the men! These Maple Bacon Cupcakes are a perfect balance of sweet and salty.
The Story:
Mornings can be rough. But when you wake up to the sun pouring in through the curtains and the smell of bacon in the air, it’s no too tough to get out from under the covers and head downstairs.
Because let’s face it… Bacon makes everything better.

Maple Bacon Cupcakes
Ingredients
Vanilla Nutmeg Cake:
- 1 box white cake mix
- 1 ½ teaspoon nutmeg
- 3 eggs
- 1/3 C. oil
- ¾ C milk
- ¾ C. sour cream
- 1 Tbsp. vanilla extract
Maple Buttercream:
- 1 C. butter softened
- 1 Tbsp. milk
- 4-5 C. powdered sugar
- 1-2 tsp. maple flavoring
Cooked Bacon to top (about 8-10 pieces)
Instructions
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1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line pans with cupcake liners.
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2. Sift cake mix and nutmeg into a bowl and set aside.
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3. In a large bowl, combine eggs, oil, milk, sour cream and vanilla extract.
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4. Add cake mix and nutmeg and stir until smooth.
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5. Fill cupcake liners ¾ full and bake for 17-22 minutes.
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6. Buttercream: Beat butter for 2 minutes. Scrape down the bowl and add milk and slowly add powdered sugar until you reach your desired consistency. Add maple flavoring, depending on what brand you use you will need a varying amount.
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7. Pipe onto cooled cupcakes and top with bacon to give it a salty and crunchy taste.
These are from my first cookbook “Your Cup of Cake”
Grease Proof Cupcake Liners from Sweets & Treats Boutique
These look ridiculously good! The icing looks different than your usual Wilton 1M, what brand/tip did you use? Can’t wait to try!
used a Wilton 2C tip!
These look fantastic, especially having not eaten breakfast this morning. Definitely, bacon makes everything better!!! I even like to put the broken pieces of bacon inside the batter. Double up on the bacon girl! 😀
What size cake mix do you use? Many mixes have reduced their sizes from 18 to around 15oz. Also would be helpful to know what size mix your book uses too. I just bought a copy but haven’t tried anything yet because I don’t want to waste ingredients. Thanks!
I used the new 15.25 oz. boxes for the book and this website!
I’m not usually a fan of bacon (which makes me weird, I know), but these look really good!!
Cupcakes for breakfast, yes. Happening.
I can smell the bacon from here! Pinned it!!
Made these for our Valentine’s Day treat and they were a HUGE hit. Thanks!!
Absolutely wonderful!! I made this for a family get together on Saturday and was told that they were BETTER than the french toast and bacon cupcakes I get from my local cupcake shop!!
Can the frosting use maple syrup instead of maple flavoring? Would it not be as strong?
It won’t be nearly as strong! I really suggest using the flavoring!
Lizzy, these look awesome! When your recipes call for milk, can I substitute half n half, buttermilk, rice milk or almond milk. I seldom buy regular milk except for puddings etc. Which of these do you think would give me the best result?
Yup! You can really use any liquid you want! I like buttermilk the best because it’s thick 🙂
Can I mix bacon bits in to this recipe? Will they get soggy and gross? Can I mix a little cream cheese into the frosting to make it more creamy and less sweet? (lots of questions, I know)!
I made these tonight and topped the cupcakes with crumbled pieces of bacon before I baked them. They weren’t crispy when they were done so my guess if you add them to the batter, they’ll probably won’t retain the crisp. However, I still liked them for a little extra salty flavor so I may add bacon to the batter next time.
Also, I doubled the icing recipe and used about 2 1/2 sticks butter and 6 oz of cream cheese. It was PERFECT….really creamy, but retained the shape when I piped it onto the cupcakes!
I used 1/3 cup of the bacon drippings in place of the oil and added chopped up bacon to the batter. Turned out ridiculously good. They were a huge hit at my son’s graduation party, and at our family reunion.
Lizzie: Loved these cupcakes, made them for a Friends of Music fund-raiser. They tasted great. One question, though (probably a guy question …): How do you get the cupcakes to be the same size, and flat on top? I tried to make them the same, but they came out different, some had more peak to them, too. Thanks!
I use food scoops (you can google that to see what they look like) that gets them all the same size. And as for peaking… they can depend on the heat of your oven and the amount of batter you put in each cupcake well.
Thank you Lizzie! I found a scoop (plus, I saw the scoop under your “favorite things” box at the top of the page and bought one like that). I will try that on your new lemon white chocolate cupcake recipe.
Thanks for the recipe. I’m definately going to try. How long do they stay fresh? Does the bacon on the icing get soggy over days? Thanks!
I baked these for a bake sale and loved them! Not to sweet.
I couldn’t find any maple flavoring at the store, so I used syrup. Still turned out pretty well!
Check out my post about them at-
http://toomanycraftstoolittletime.blogspot.com/2016/03/remember-me.html