Best Easy Valentine’s Themed Cupcake Recipes And Design Ideas Your Kids Can Actually Make

Let’s face it, when you are parents, Valentine’s Day is a kids holiday! Valentine’s Day can be a great opportunity to build bonds with you children by doing something creative and artistic together. Baking Valentine’s Day cupcakes is one such activity you can do.

Deciding on a Valentine’s Day cupcake decoration can be difficult though. The web is full of beautiful pictures with ideas for creating stunning Valentine’s Day cupcakes, including amazing frosting (looking at you pinterest and instagram.) Reality is, many of them are unattainable by you, let alone your little one. We at Risebrite have taken some time to research some of the easiest ways for you and you kids to create cupcakes for Valentine’s Day.

How To Add Valentine’s Day Design Easily

Some simple ways to make cupcakes have a Valentine’s Day theme are 1) Create heart shapes with the sponge cake, 2) use heart shaped edible cupcake toppings or 3) buy Valentine’s Day themed cupcake decorations. You can also choose a flavor of cupcake with a color that goes well with Valentine’s Day decor. Combining one or more of these strategies is also an option. Below we outline each of these strategies.

Summary of Kids Valentine’s Day Cupcake Ideas

Cupcake Shape Designs

• Heart Shaped Cupcake
• Surprise Inside Cupcake

Cupcake Toppings

• Heart Shaped Strawberries
• Heart Shaped Candies
• Red Sprinkles

Store Bought Cupcake Decorations

• Toppers 
• Wraps
• Cups

Flavors

• Red velvet
• Chocolate
• Strawberry
• Vanilla or White

How To Make Heart Shaped Cupcake Designs That Are Easy For Kids

It is actually easier than you think for kids to create heart shapes with sponge cake. Both as an overall shape or an embedded one.

The Heart Shaped Cupcake

The first time we saw a heart shaped cupcake, we were perplexed. There must be some sort of heart shaped cupcake tin out there people are using. Who wants to keep one of those in their cabinets all year long, just to be able to use them once a year!

Turns out, it is actually really easy to make heart shaped cupcakes for Valentine’s Day. It is something your kids can easily do using the cupcake tin you may already have. The secret is glass marbles. Placing the marble next to the cupcake cup inside the tin creates a heart shaped dimple in the cup’s shape, and your cupcake batter will take on a heart shape when poured inside. You can find a heart shaped cupcake recipe here

Heart Shaped “Surprise Inside” Cupcakes

A slightly more advanced, but still easy Valentine’s Day cupcake design technique is to make a cupcake that has a heart shaped sponge cake of a different color (usually red or pink) embedded inside an outer layer of cupcake. This is not as hard as it sounds. All you need is a cake pan and small heart shaped cookie cutter.

First, bake the Valentine’s Day flavored/colored cake in the cake pan. Then use the cookie cutter to cut out small heart shapes from the cake. As your are pouring the batter that will make up the outer layer of the cupcake into the baking cups, place a heart shaped cake piece standing up into the batter when it is about a quarter filled. Then pour in the rest of the batter taking care that the inner cake does not fall over. The cake inside will not overcook, because it is protected by the outer layer of batter. This design is pure genius if you ask us. You kids will love it! You can find a recipe for surprise inside heart shaped cupcakes here

Easy Valentine’s Day Cupcake Decoration Ideas For Kids

We have talked about some of the simple ways you can create Valentine’s Day cupcakes during the baking process. Another way you can add a Valentine’s Day to you kids cupcakes is with design after they are baked. This includes both edible items like fruits or candies on top, and inedible cupcake decorations.

Heart Shaped Strawberry Topped Valentine’s Day Cupcakes

We thought this recipe is extremely clever, and it is kid friendly too, woohoo! There is the added bonus that strawberries are healthier than more sugary cupcake toppings. To achieve this super cute design, all your kid has to do is cut sliced strawberries into heart shapes and place them on top of the frosting. That’s it! Viola! Valentine’s Day cupcakes your kids will love. We will let you check out their post for the rest of the details, but kudos to them for this awesome idea!

Other Delicious Topping Ideas For Kids Valentine’s Day Cupcakes

Sprinkling some heart shaped sweets on top of your kids cupcakes is another easy way to add a Valentine’s Day theme. Some of the ones we have seen include heart shaped hard candies and heart shaped “gummies”. You can also just go with simple red colored sprinkles if you are unable to locate any heart shaped ones. These go well with white frosting.

Store Bought Valentine’s Day Cupcake Decorations

Buying some simple cupcake decorations is an easy low effort way of adding some Valentine’s Day flair to kids cupcakes. These decorations can include: cupcake toppers, cups and wrappers.

The cupcake toppers are super simple. They are just a small piece of plastic or paper attached to the end of a lollipop stick. These can be plunged into your kid’s cupcakes without damaging them. Wrappers are also super simple. They are a thin piece of cardboard that wraps around the outside of the cupcake’s base. 

Both cake toppers and wraps provide a little extra boost to the cuteness level of a kids cupcake creation. Often times you can find a Valentine’s Day cupcake decoration kit that includes both the toppers and wraps together.

Cake Flavors For Valentine’s Day Themed Kids Cupcakes

There are a few flavors of cupcake that lend themselves well to a Valentine’s Day theme that your kids can bake. These flavors include: Red Velvet, chocolate, strawberry and vanilla or white.

Red Velvet

The “king of kings” of red colored cupcake flavors over the last 10 years or so has got to be Red Velvet. The deep crimson red color of these cupcakes really convey the feeling of love. Unfortunately, A “real” Red Velvet cake, created by a reaction cocoa and buttermilk or vinegar can not be created with modern day cocoa powder. For this reason most “Red Velvet” cupcakes are just chocolate cupcakes with a lot of red food coloring. Red Velvet cupcakes are usually topped with a white cream cheese frosting, adding an additional contribution to the Valentine’s Day theme of red and white.

Chocolate

There is no other ingredient more associated with love than chocolate, which makes it an obvious choice for any Valentine’s occasion.  Plus, most kids love chocolate! Chocolate cupcake recipes can be really simple, even when it is a homemade cupcake recipe. Chocolate cupcakes are versatile as well. Several colors and flavors of icing can be paired with a simple chocolate cupcake. 

While chocolate itself is synonymous with Valentine’s day, the color is not so much. Frostings with colors like white, red or pink will help add a Valentine’s Day “vibe” to you kids creations, but we would recommend “theming” it up with some of the extras outlined above as well

Strawberry

Strawberries are second to chocolate in their association with this holiday of love. This is mostly because of the chocolate covered strawberries that adults tend to consume on a romantic evening. However, the pink color of many strawberry flavored ingredients go well for a kids cupcake recipe. The reds and whites of Valentines Day make pink a cute in between color that adds a more youthful feeling to the creations.

Another reason strawberry may be a good Valentine’s Day Cupcake flavor choice is that like chocolate, store bought mixes and frostings are easy to locate. This is advantageous if you are going for theme over culinary experience. That may be especially appropriate for younger children.  Lastly, strawberry is a simple flavor like chocolate that kids are probably more familiar with.

Vanilla or White

Obviously “white” is not a flavor, but we are sneaking it in here. White colored cupcakes make for an excellent pallet for kids Valentine’s day cupcakes. That is because white does not conflict with any other color. The absence of color allows any red cupcake designs or decorations to truly stand out. This is not true with chocolate cupcakes where the red and deep brown may not have the same impact on a young child as it does with an adult.