These Snickers Cupcakes transform plain chocolate cupcakes into decadent, candy-bar inspired creations, featuring a peanut caramel filling, fluffy peanut butter frosting, and LOTS of chocolate and candy bars.
I have never understood the gourmet cupcake craze. Don’t get me wrong—I understand the appeal of cupcakes themselves. Bite-sized cakes, with a 50/50 frosting ratio, adorably petite, so cute they’re practically batting Disney princess eyes at you, and socially acceptable to eat as an afternoon snack? That I get.
What I don’t get is paying upwards of $6.50 for said cupcake, and waiting in crazy long lines for them, and fetishizing the shops that sell them. It’s just some cake in a cute paper wrapper. Maybe with a scattering of sprinkles or a fondant doodad on top. Let’s all calm down now.
So here’s whatcha do. Instead of spending $50 on a dozen fancy-shmancy cupcakes, take those two twenties and go to the store. Buy a bag of miniature Snickers, and some caramels, and some peanuts if you don’t already have them. Take the remaining money, and buy yourself some slippers and a pair of loose sweatpants, or maybe a Slanket. You are going to want to get verrrrry comfortable when you enjoy these Snickers cupcakes.
These beauties start with a moist, rich chocolate cupcake. Use the best cocoa you can find, please, because a cupcake made with pale, tasteless cocoa is no kind of cupcake at all. The cakes are hollowed out and filled with a peanut-studded caramel, then they’re topped with peanut-marshmallow frosting that mimics the peanut nougat found in a Snickers bar.
Are we finished, you ask? Not remotely! Top them with a big drizzle of hot fudge sauce, a scattering of salted peanuts, and a chunk of a Snickers bar. Oh, you fancy thing. Resist the urge to sell them to your friends and coworkers for $6.50 apiece and instead bask in the knowledge that you created an edible masterpiece. Snuggle into your Slanket in triumph.
These beauties will win over even the most skeptical cupcake doubters. If you’re a lover of candy bars, and a lover of excess, and a lover of cupcakes the size of your face, you are going to be a lover of this recipe.
Recipe notes: If the store-bought caramels you’re using are very stiff, you might want to increase the amount of cream to 1/2 cup to make sure that the filling is nice and soft. No one wants to chomp on a big hunk of hard caramel in their cupcake! The pretty cupcake wrappers I used are called tulip cups and can be purchased on Amazon.
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Snickers Cupcakes
Ingredients
For the Cupcakes:
- 7.8 oz all-purpose flour, (1 ¾ cups)
- 3 oz unsweetened cocoa powder, (1 cup)
- 1 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 cup buttermilk, full-fat, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup sour cream, full-fat, at room temperature
- 2 tbsp water, can substitute brewed coffee for richer flavor
- 6 oz unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 4.75 oz granulated sugar, (2/3 cup)
- 5 oz brown sugar, (2/3 cup)
- 2 large eggs, at room temperature
- 1 tbsp vanilla extract
For the Caramel-Peanut Filling:
- 14 oz soft caramels
- 1/3 cup heavy cream
- 1 tbsp unsalted butter
- 1/2 cup salted peanuts, coarsely chopped
For the Peanut-Marshmallow Frosting:
- 8 oz unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 12 oz creamy peanut butter, (1 ¼ cups)
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/4 cup heavy cream
- 1 lb powdered sugar, (4 cups)
- 7 oz marshmallow cream, (1 jar)
To Finish:
- 1/2 cup chocolate fudge sauce
- 1/4 cup salted peanuts, chopped
- 10 fun-size Snickers bars, cut in half or coarsely chopped
Instructions
To Make the Cupcakes:
- Preheat the oven to 350 F. Line 20 cupcake cavities with paper liners.
- In a bowl, sift together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt. In a separate bowl or large mixing cup, whisk together the buttermilk, sour cream, and water (or coffee).
- In the bowl of a large stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat together the butter and sugars until they’re light and fluffy, about 3-5 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition, then add the vanilla extract.
- With the mixer running on low speed, add a quarter of the dry ingredients. When it’s mostly mixed in, add a third of the liquid ingredients. Continue to alternate adding drys and liquids, ending with the dry ingredients. When the drys are almost all mixed in and only a few streaks of flour remain, stop the mixer and finish mixing by hand with a spatula. Scrape down the bottom and sides of the bowl.
- Scoop the batter into the lined cupcake pans. Bake in the preheated oven for 22-25 minutes, until the tops of the cupcakes spring back when lightly pressed. Cool completely.
To Make the Filling:
- Don’t make the filling until you’re ready to fill the cupcakes. Combine the caramels, cream, and butter in a microwave-safe bowl. Microwave in 30-second increments, stirring well after every 30 seconds. They may resist melting and coming together at first, but continue to stir and heat until you have a smooth, fluid mixture. Add the chopped peanuts and stir them in.
To Make the Frosting:
- Combine the butter and peanut butter in the bowl of a large stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment, and beat on medium-high speed until light and fluffy. Add the vanilla, cream, and powdered sugar, and mix on low speed until the sugar is moistened. Raise the speed to medium, and continue to beat until the mixture lightens and becomes fluffy and smooth. Add the marshmallow cream and stir it in by hand using a rubber spatula, scraping the bottom and sides of the bowl well. Once the frosting is well-mixed, spoon it into a pastry bag fitted with a large star tip.
Assembly:
- Use a sharp paring knife to cut a cone-shaped hole out of the top of the cupcakes. Scoop the caramel-peanut filling into the hole, coming almost all the way to the top. Cut the bottom off of the cupcake cone, and replace the top of the cupcake on top of the caramel. (The cupcake filling can be eaten or thrown away—I trust you will find something to do with it.) If the caramel starts to get a little hard to work with, microwave it briefly until it is fluid again.
- Once all of the cupcakes are filled, pipe the frosting on top in one big decorative swirl. Add a drizzle of fudge sauce or chocolate ganache, a sprinkling of chopped peanuts, and half of a fun-sized Snickers bar on top. Store Snickers Cupcakes in an airtight container at room temperature, and enjoy within 3-4 days.
Video
Measuring Tips
Our recipes are developed using weight measurements, and we highly recommend using a kitchen scale for baking whenever possible. However, if you prefer to use cups, volume measurements are provided as well. PLEASE NOTE: the adage “8 oz = 1 cup” is NOT true when speaking about weight, so don’t be concerned if the measurements don’t fit this formula.
Want to learn more about baking measurements and conversion?
I absolutely LOVE Snickers so I can’t wait to try this recipe. I know what you mean about the gourmet cupcake craze. My friends’ sister does cakes, etc for a living. I tried one of her “beautiful to look at” cupcakes and found it to be fairly plain, dry and disappointing. I didn’t finish it. I’ll bet these are fantastic!
Hi elizabeth
for the filling you mention that you used caramel bars… in the UK we get caramel in a tin and its medium to thick in consistency…. Can I just use that and just put in the peanuts or …. And oooh a another thing we don’t get marshmallow cream so can I Leave that out?
I will really appreciate if you answer to the above
ps. Your cakes look aaaaah-mazing! I am gobsmacked and can’t wait to try out these mouth watering recipes of yours! Tc x
Hi Haf! Yes, you can use the tinned caramel. If it seems like it might be too thick to easily bite/chew in the middle of a cupcake, you can add a little cream to it to thin it out, but in general it sounds like that will work well.
Regarding the marshmallow cream, you can leave it out without any problems. Your frosting might not be quite as light and airy, but it’ll still be a good peanut butter frosting! Please let me know how they turn out, and I hope you enjoy them! Thanks for visiting my site. 🙂
Hello, I am going to make these for my boss’s birthday tomorrow but am confused on one part, for the frosting, which type of “cream” are u referring to? Is it heavy cream ? or milk? or something i dont know about? Thanks!
Hi Marcia! I typically use heavy or whipping cream, but milk is also a fine substitute. 🙂 Hope they turn out well for you!
Hi Haf,
We can get marshmallow cream in uk,its called its called,’fluff’,you can get it in some supermarkets or on line at,’firebox’.
BEST frosting EVER! I bake a lot and this may be my new favorite “go-to” cupcake recipe. It is certainly labor intensive, but who cares when you have such great results! Thanks for the super recipe and great directions!
Awesome! So glad you loved them, Heather! Sometimes the little extra effort is worth it–if you’re going to have cupcakes, you might as well go big, right?
I made these for an office cupcake baking competition and am pleased to say I won! Thanks for the great recipe! I do have to say they took an awful long time to make, but they are simply fantastic (especially the filling and frosting)! I will definitely make again!
Yay, congratulations! So glad you loved them. Hope there was a trophy involved! 🙂
OMG this is totally awesome! I will try them when I’m at home! 😀 <3 I'm so in love!
How high did you fill the tulip cups when you baked the cupcakes? They look amazing, thanks for sharing!!
Hi Liz, I filled them about 2/3 full (so, about as much as you’d fill a regular cupcake liner.) The tulip cups are much higher than regular liners so the cupcakes don’t come up over the top, but that’s what piles of frosting are for. 🙂 Thanks for stopping by!
just made cupcakes I baked them at the tie and temp stated when I pulled them out they seem runny so I cooked them for five more min turned out same way is that how there they are supposed to be or did I do something wrong
Hi Ed, Sounds like something went wrong. The cupcakes shouldn’t be runny. It’s hard to know from your description if they were just underbaked, and needed more time, or if something went wrong with the recipe. The cake batter should be fairly thick (not thin and pour-able, but thick enough to scoop) when you make it, and when they’re baked the cupcakes should have a light, springy texture that bounces back when you gently press on the top. So there may have been a mis-measurement with the ingredients, or your oven may have been below temp and they needed more time. One thing that might be helpful is to use an oven thermometer, if you don’t have one already. It can tell you if your oven runs hot or cold, so you know you need to adjust recipes. (Mine runs about 25 F hot, usually.) They’re about $5 at a grocery store.
I just made these cupcakes and
They are super rich!! I think I would leave the peanuts out of the filling if I make them again. It’s too much in my opinion. With that said, they taste just like a Snicker bar and were good.
Hi I was about to make these but was wondering, if I make them in advance will the caramel inside the cupcake get hard if I leave it at room temperature? And is it better to fill right before serving for a warmer caramel?
Hi, You can make them in advance! The caramel won’t flow out of the cupcake, but it shouldn’t get hard–it should be sort of chewy. If you’re worried you can add more cream (maybe up to 1/2 c?) to the caramel when you’re heating it, to make it more fluid so that it will set looser.
I love this post! I feel the same way about paying for a cupcake. What’s the point when I can make it myself. My husband & I are a great team in the kitchen when it comes to baking. I have on 2 occassions paid $3.50+ for a cupcake, the first time the cake was dry, but the frosting was AMAZING! The 2nd time was just a flat out disappointment. I have since made my own take on that first cupcake (Salted Caramel) and it turned out pretty tasty. I will likely be trying a version of Snickers cupcakes next week for a co-workers birthday as this is her favorite candy bar.