These vegan lemon cupcakes are moist, delicious, and full of flavor! The best part: these cupcakes are super easy to make and require just one bowl!
Is there anything better than lemony desserts in the spring? Most of the year I'm all about chocolate, but when the temperatures just start to warm up I start to crave things like lemon bars, lemon cake, and lemon cookies. Lemon flavored sweets are like sunshine in your face!
These lemony cupcakes are my latest lemon creation. I've been baking them all spring, all while perfecting the recipe. I've finally come up with what I think is the absolute best vegan lemon cupcake recipe ever. These cupcakes are moist, delicious, and full of lemony flavor.
They're also really easy to make, requiring just one bowl! I highly recommend baking up a batch to enjoy this spring (or really, any time of year!).
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Ingredients You'll Need
- Flour. I've only tested the recipe with all-purpose wheat flour, so I can't say how the recipe will turn out with anything else.
- Sugar. Make sure your sugar is organic. This will keep the recipe vegan.
- Baking powder.
- Baking soda.
- Salt.
- Non-dairy milk. Pretty much any variety that's unflavored and unsweetened will work in this recipe. Try almond milk, cashew milk, soy milk or oat milk.
- Canola oil. Feel free to substitute your favorite baking oil, such as corn oil, vegetable oil, or coconut oil.
- Lemon juice. Freshly squeezed juice will give your cupcakes the best lemony flavor. Definitely don't use the bottled stuff.
- Lemon extract.
- Vanilla extract.
- Lemon zest.
Tip: Make sure your ingredients are at room temperature before you begin mixing. This may mean warming up your non-dairy milk and lemon juice if they've been in the fridge.
How They're Made
Below is a detailed photo tutorial on how to make this dish. Scroll all the way down if you'd like to skip right to the recipe!
- Start by whisking your dry ingredients together in a large mixing bowl: flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
- Stir your wet ingredients together in a small container (a liquid measuring cup works great!), then pour the mixture into the dry ingredients.
Tip: Depending on what kind of milk you use, it might curdle a bit when you add your lemon juice. This is totally fine!
- Use an electric mixer to beat the ingredients together. You can use a hand mixer or stand mixer for this — cook's choice!
- Beat the mixture for about 1 minute, just until everything is mixed and your cupcake batter is creamy.
- Pour the batter into a paper-lined twelve cavity muffin tin, then pop it into the oven to bake.
- Bake the cupcakes for about 20 minutes. You can test them for doneness by inserting a toothpick into the center of one — it should come out clean.
- Let your vegan lemon cupcakes cool completely before frosting them. I like to top mine with vegan buttercream frosting or vegan cream cheese frosting. You could even keep it simple and top your cupcakes with a sprinkle of organic powdered sugar.
Shelf-Life & Storage
Store your cupcakes in an airtight container and they'll keep at room temperature for about 3 days, or in the fridge for about 1 week. You can also freeze them if they're unfrosted. They'll last about 3 months in the freezer.
Frequently Asked Questions
You could probably substitute an all-purpose gluten-free flour blend for wheat flour, but I haven't tried, so no guarantees!
If your cupcakes don't rise it's usually due to old baking powder and/or soda. Sprinkle baking soda in a small glass of vinegar. Do the same for baking powder, but use water. Both should fizz. If either doesn't, it's old and time to replace it.
More Vegan Cupcake Recipes
- Vegan Chocolate Cupcakes
- Vegan Vanilla Cupcakes
- Vegan Pink Velvet Cupcakes
- Chocolate Frosted Peanut Butter Cupcakes
- Mulled Red Wine Chocolate Cupcakes
Like this recipe? If so, please stop back and leave me a review and rating below if you try it! Also be sure to follow me on Facebook, Pinterest or Instagram, or subscribe to my newsletter for more recipes like this one!
📖 Recipe
Easy Vegan Lemon Cupcakes
Ingredients
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 cup organic granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ¾ cup unsweetened non-dairy milk
- â…” cup canola oil
- ¼ cup lemon juice
- 1 teaspoon lemon extract
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 teaspoon lemon zest
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F and line a 12 cavity muffin tin with cupcake liners.
- Whisk the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in a large mixing bowl.
- In a smaller container such as a liquid measuring cup, stir together the milk, oil, lemon juice, lemon extract, vanilla extract, and lemon zest.
- Pour the milk mixture into the flour mixture, then beat the ingredients together using an electric mixer at high speed. Continue beating the mixture for about 1 minute, until a smooth batter is formed.
- Divide the batter among the muffin cavities.
- Bake the cupcakes for about 20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center of one comes out clean.
- Place the cupcakes on a cooling rack and let them cool completely before frosting.
- Serve.
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Super easy and super delicious. I’ve been looking for a lemon cupcake recipe for ages and this one is perfect . It will be my go-to recipe from now on. Thank you for sharing it
For the GF bakers: I made these today using Bob’s Red Mill One-to-One GF flour blend; I specify only because I’ve had wildly varying degrees of success with other brands in other recipes….these came out perfectly.
Excellent taste and very light texture.