Brown Butter Peach Cupcakes are perfect for summertime celebrations. Made with browned butter, these peachy cupcakes have a moist, tender crumb that will keep you coming back for more.
Brown Butter Peach Cupcakes
Nothing says summertime quite like a fresh ripe peach, complete with juice dribbling down your chin. However, it is a challenge to get that bright peach flavor into my baked goods, but I have figured it out with this easy cupcake recipe.
Peaches have to be my absolute favorite fruit to eat fresh in season and they work beautifully with browned butter. If you have never worked with browned butter, you’re in for a treat.
Browned butter is super easy to make and adds a rich, nutty flavor to your baked goods. All you have to do is cook melted butter over medium heat until it barely starts to brown and then remove it from the heat before it burns. It doesn’t take long at all.
It is tempting to brown the butter in every recipe calling for plain old butter. The flavor is enchanting and it is perfect paired with sweet, juicy peaches.
Peach Cupcakes
Once I decided to use the browned butter in the batter, the next trick was to get that fresh peach flavor into the cupcakes. Peach puree provides a mild flavor that easily gets lost in the sugar and butter.
My first attempt at making these cupcakes with peach puree ended in utter, dismal failure. The batter overflowed the tins and the cupcakes didn’t taste anything like peaches!
I went back to the drawing board. And after further experimenting, I added chunks of peach into the batter along with the peach puree.
It was magical. I was thrilled to discover that the peach chunks provided a burst of fresh peach in each bite and actually enhanced the peach puree flavor in the batter.
There is also bit of peach puree in the frosting, but it is not overpowering. The tangy cream cheese is a perfect compliment to the tender cupcakes.
These understated cupcakes are excellent for picnics or showers. Or you can box them up to give as a thoughtful gift. When frosted in a rose pattern, these cupcakes make a wonderful dessert for summertime brunches. The soft, natural color of the cream cheese frosting and peach puree is lovely.
I have some exciting recipes in the works that I can hardly wait to share with you, starting with this one. These Brown Butter Peach Cupcakes rank up there as one of my favorite cupcakes ever.
If you can’t get enough peachy keen flavor this summer, try some of my other delicious peach recipes. Peaches and Cream Bars are a peach custard meets cookie bar that my family loves.
If you liked these Brown Butter Peach Cupcakes and want to keep rolling with browned butter and peaches, try my Brown Butter Peach Sweet Rolls. Yes, you should. You won’t regret it.
And summer just isn’t summer without peach pie, but instead of a traditional peach pie, I love making these Fresh Peach Pie Bars.
Whatever you decide to make this summer, Enjoy!
COOK’S NOTE: PLEASE note that you do not use the full amount of peach puree that is made in the blender. If you do this, they may fall apart. Measure out the amounts indicated in the recipe for both the cake and the frosting.
Also, after browning the butter, you should be left with just over ½ cup of butter. You will not be adding ¾ cup of browned butter to the cake batter.
Peach Cupcake Recipe
- Brown the butter in a small saucepan over medium heat, stirring occasionally. Remove the butter from the heat and pour into a separate heat proof bowl to stop the browning. Cool completely.
- Preheat oven to 325 F. Whisk together the brown butter, peach puree, brown sugar, white sugar and vanilla. Beat in eggs. In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Gently stir into the large bowl along with diced peaches, mixing until just combined.
- Fill lined cupcake tins ¾ full. Bake for 20 minutes or until the spring back when lightly touched. Cool completely on wire racks.
- To make the frosting, beat together butter and cream cheese until fluffy. Beat in peach puree and vanilla. Add enough of the powdered sugar until a piping or spreading consistency is reached. Spread or pipe the frosting onto cooled cupcakes.
Brown Butter Peach Cupcakes
Ingredients
Peach Puree Ingredients
- 3 cups diced fresh peaches
- 1 tablespoon white sugar
- 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
- 1 tablespoon water
Cake Ingredients
- 3/4 cup butter
- 1 cup peach puree, prepared as directed
- 1 cup packed brown sugar
- 1/2 cup white sugar
- 1/2 tsp vanilla
- 2 large eggs room temperature
- 2 cups all purpose flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 2 cups finely diced peaches
Frosting Ingredients
- 1/2 cup butter softened
- 4 oz cream cheese softened
- 1/2 cup peach puree, prepared as directed
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 5-6 cups powdered sugar
Instructions
Peach Puree Instructions
- Heat peaches, lemon juice, water, and white sugar in a saucepan over medium heat. Bring to a boil and let it simmer for 5 minutes, stirring frequently.
- Remove from heat and let cool to a warm temperature. Blend in a blender until smooth. Cool completely before use.
Cake Instructions
- Brown the butter in a small saucepan over medium heat, stirring occasionally. Remove the butter from the heat and pour into a separate heat proof bowl to stop the browning. Cool completely.
- Preheat oven to 325 F. Whisk together the brown butter, peach puree, brown sugar, white sugar and vanilla. Beat in eggs. In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Gently stir into the large bowl along with diced peaches, mixing until just combined.
- Fill lined cupcake tins ¾ full. Bake for 20 minutes or until the spring back when lightly touched. Cool completely on wire racks.
Frosting Instructions
- Beat together butter and cream cheese until fluffy. Beat in peach puree and vanilla. Add enough of the powdered sugar until a piping or spreading consistency is reached. Spread or pipe onto cooled cupcakes
Nutrition
{originally published 8/4/14 – recipe notes and photos updated 5/11/21}
Recipe adapted from Two Peas and Their Pod.
Shashi @ runninsrilankan says
Wow – these are gorgeous! Love the extra peach chunks and peach puree in these – and the rose petal frosting – simply gorgeous!
janelle says
I love this, anything brown butter is on my list of awesomeness.
Karen @ The Food Charlatan says
Mallory these are fabulous!! So pretty and I LOVE this flavor combo. I’m so trying these before all the peaches are gone!!
dina says
they look delicious!
Nicole says
Stopping by from Wake up Wednesdays. Wow! That recipe for the peach frosting sounds amazing. Pinning!
Mallory says
Thanks for pinning, Nicole.
Kelly says
I just bought a crate of peaches yesterday. What a beautiful way to bake with them! Thanks!
Jessica @ A Kitchen Addiction says
Gorgeous cupcakes, Mallory!
marcie says
Peaches are one of my favorite summer fruits, and this is such a great way to use them! I love the addition of the brown butter. Pretty cupcakes!
Jill says
These are beautiful and sound delicious. Pinned
Ashley | The Recipe Rebel says
These look fabulous! So fresh and perfect for summer 🙂
Karly says
Such pretty cupcakes and I’m loving the summer fresh peaches! Thanks for linking up with What’s Cookin’ Wednesday!
Denise says
These look lovely! Novice question here: do you peel the peaches for the puree or leave the skin on?
Mallory says
I would recommend peeling the peaches first.
Megan says
I made these tonight and the flavor is amazing! However, the cupcakes fell and we’re extremely gooey and wet, falling apart. The batter itself looked normal though before baking. These are so good that I want to try another batch tomorrow night. I followed the recipe to a Tee though. After eating one baked, it’s almost like the wasn’t enough flour. Trying to find where I messed up. Thoughts? Thanks, these are worth getting right!
Mallory says
It’s nice to hear from you, Megan. While I was testing them, I made a batch that were wet, gooey and fell too. I tried the recipe again, adding more flour and they turned out okay for me, which is the recipe I have posted. So I would say try adding a bit more flour as well. I’m going to make them again and see how they turn out for me. Thanks for the comment!
Emily says
These are AMAZING!!! I just made them, and oh my GOSH, the brown butter makes all the difference. I personally will add a bit more diced peaches next time; but other than that, SUCH a great recipe! I will definitely be making these again and again.
Sherri says
So, what I have to wonder, does the 3 cups get split into the batter and icing. Or all 3 cups in batter and another 1:2 cup in icing?
Emily says
Divide the purée. Measure out the stated amount for the cupcakes and the frosting. I still had some left.
marybeth says
How long do u brown your butter for? Are we talking dark brown, or just a tent of brown? Thanks looking forward to making these!
Mallory says
I brown it pretty dark, just a shade before burnt. It all depends on the flavor you want and I like a strong brown butter flavor. However, make sure the butter isn’t burnt, because burnt butter is pretty terrible. Hope you enjoy!
Tasha says
Your cupcakes look and sound delicious! I am about to make them but that seems like a lot of butter to me. How many cupcakes does this make? Most recipes I use make about ~30 cupcakes and use ~1/2c butter… what does adding more butter do? Can I decrease the butter? Thanks!
Mallory says
Thanks, Tasha. I know this is a lot of butter, but that is the amount before it is browned. Browning the butter reduces it and shrinks all the fat particles down so it’s not as much as you think. I would recommend sticking to the amount in the recipe. But if you don’t mind a failure or two, you can always experiment. I made these cupcakes several times before I got the right ratios.
Jessica says
I assume these would be good for a few days at least. Is refrigeration best? I am making these for “Princess Peach” cupcakes for my daughters Mario themes birthday party, and would love to make these a day or so in advance, but I am worried the peaches in the recipe will make the cupcakes soggy. These sound delish and I can NOT wait to bake them:)
Mallory says
Hi Jessica, I’ve only kept mine overnight and they were still good the next day. I can’t vouch for longer than that. That sounds like a fun birthday party!
Megan says
Hi there!
I wanted to make these cupcakes and noticed that you had two different amounts posted for the brown butter in the cupcakes.
Mallory says
Hi Megan! Thanks for pointing that out. For some reason I had two version of the recipe posted. I’m not sure what happened there. I removed the wrong one! Happy baking!
Sybille says
Hi, I just wanted to say that I’ve made your recipe today and it was the best muffins recipe I’ve ever made! seriously, thank you very much… Except, I have replace the butter with the same quantity of unsweeted apple sauce and put a bit of litchys in the puree. It was perfect!
Mother from Sunnyvale says
Hi,
If I want to use regular butter and not the browned butter. How much should I add.
Also instead of browned butter can I used clarified butter.
Regards
Mallory says
I’ve never substituted regular butter in the recipe so I’m not sure. Mans I’m not familiar with clarified butter either.
Laurie says
This may be a dumb question but are you just browning the butter for the cupcakes or for the frosting also?!
Mallory says
I just browned the butter for the cupcakes. But browning it for the frosting would be good too!
Virginia says
I made these and while they are delicious, the cupcake turned out more dense and muffin-ie. I am pleased to have discovered the wonder of browned butter! *drool*
Amy says
Can you make the puree days before mixing it with the ingredients for the frosting? I’m making the cupcakes for Friday and it’s Tuesday.
Lisa says
Would these work well if I left out the cinnamon? They sound so good but I despise cinnamon and find that it’s too overwhelming for me to put in any recipe (no one on earth agrees with me haha).
Cindy says
Can’t wait to try this recipe! How did you make the rose shape? I’ve been out of decorating for a couple of decades and this doesn’t look like any tip I have….how did you make it sooo gorgeous?
Jaime says
So, I am making these for my son’s first birthday this weekend but I was wondering if it is possible to adapt the peach puree to home canned peaches? My peaches are canned in a simple syrup and I didn’t know if that sweetness would effect the amount of sugar that goes into the puree.
Thanks!
Mallory says
I’ve never tried it, but it may work. I would just make sure the peaches are very well drained.
Maria says
The cupcakes are delicious! But the frosting is a bummer. The flavor is good but the texture is all wrong-foamy and runny, not smooth and creamy. I think 1/2 cup peach purée is way too much. I can’t imagine what I did wrong, the instructions are simple and I’ve made frosting a hundred times, but advice is always welcome. Thanks for the cake recipe, that alone is great.
Mitzie says
Just made these and they were a huge hit!
Thanks for the recipe!
Abbey says
I just made these and the peach cake recipe is amazing! But for the frosting, I added the powdered sugar up to six cups and it still didn’t get to the right consistency… too runny to frost the cupcakes.
Lauren says
I made this recipe for coworkers birthday. The timing was right, she loves peaches and I picked up a 1/2 bushel of peaches on my way home from the beach last week. Everyone at work raved about them. Looks like I’ll be making the recipe again this weekend! Thank you!
ps. As far as the frosting goes, I used about 5 cups of powdered sugar and it turned out perfectly. I assume that the ripeness may affect any frosting issues? Mine were JUST ripe enough and there wasn’t a lot of extra liquid in the pan after heating.
Wendy says
What temperature do you bake these?
Courtney says
Has anyone tried to make this as a cake? I would love to try it as a birthday cake. Thank you!
Catherine Davidson says
I tried these today, they fell and were gooey. Second batch baked at 350 on convection, better but still fell a bit.
Carrie says
Made these and they were delish! I had to cook them longer (approx 4 extra minutes), but they were moist and a little on the dense side (my preference) and super tasty. I didn’t make the frosting because I had leftover Swiss meringue buttercream from another cake, so I just mixed the extra puree into that and it worked beautifully. In the future, I might add a little peach extract or schnapps to boost the peach flavor of the frosting, but everything else was perfect!
Crystal Hubert says
Can we refrigerate the batter over night?
Mallory says
I haven’t tried that. I would bake first and then keep the cupcakes overnight.
trishnat says
it looks good and I know it will taste even better, I’m definitely gonna try it, keep posting such recipes.
Shweta Kanda says
Can you please also suggest some ingredient to replace eggs ?
Kate D says
I made these cupcakes today. The batter was a little wet so I had to cook them for a little over 30 minutes. I also only added one cup of diced peaches since my kids are particular on texture. I added flour to the second batch that worked out better. I’m excited to bring them to an outdoor picnic 🙂 thanks for the recipe!
Lauren M says
These were SO GOOD. I doubled the cake recipe, but only made a single batch of frosting and it ended up working out perfectly. 9/10 times I end up with more frosting than I need, so I figured I could always make more but I didn’t want to end up with an abundance. I was so happy to end up with even a small amount left over when I finished frosting double the number of cupcakes. I did end up using the full 6 cups of powdered sugar and then put it all into a piping bag, popped it into the fridge to settle up a bit before frosting since it seemed a little lose. I wasn’t sure whether I should peel the peaches that were being diced to fold into the batter, but ultimately decided not to because I thought a little extra color/texture wouldn’t hurt. Turned out great! I made these for a peach themed baby shower and they were such a hit, so many people asked for the recipe.
joxelyn says
So you use saltes butter or unsalted?
Jill says
I will be the third person here that will say that my cupcakes were also undercooked and didn’t rise. I cooked the first batch for 35 minutes and they were still gooey inside. The second batch at 375F also didn’t rise. Cooked these for 30 minutes. This recipe should be removed.
Mary says
Hi Jill, I’ve reviewed the recipe in an attempt to figure out why it is working so well for some people and bombing for others. My best guess is that too much puree or butter is winding up in the cupcakes. I’ve added a baking tip to the post to hopefully prevent it in the future. I’ve also retested this recipe and it’s working as written.
Cortney says
Made these last night and was so excited for the brown butter! Overall, they’re a good cupcake, but pretty time consuming with slicing all the peaches and processes that have to cool completely before baking. You could really taste the brown butter goodness in the batter, but for some reason, it seemed to disappear once baked. We still loved getting a chunk of peach when we ate them, but they are so dense that they really didn’t taste of much other than the frosting and the occasional diced peach. Thanks for the recipe, though!
Rosalynn Mumpower says
Made these for a Fourth of July party and they were an absolute hit. Multiple people sought me out and told me they were amazing. One thing I will say is that the frosting turned out like a glaze. I kept adding powdered sugar but could not get a piping consistency. I will definitely be making this again but will probably look up a different recipe for the frosting so that the cupcakes can look as good as they tasted.
Mary says
I’m glad you enjoyed the cupcakes, Rosalynn!
Wanda says
I’m wanting to make a princess cupcake cake. How many does this batch make?
Mary says
This recipe makes 18 cupcakes, Wanda.
MrsC says
I will make these this weekend. Do I need any adjustments for high altitude? I live in Denver. Thanks!
Mary says
I’ve never made these are high altitude. I’m glad it worked out for you!
MrsC says
These cupcakes are super yummy!!!!! Moist and the peach purée is delish. However, mine didn’t rise. I do live in Colorado and didn’t make any adjustments for the altitude because i don’t know how. They didn’t fall apart and the taste was awesome. The texture was a little dense but I liked it. The frosting however was too sweet for my taste. I ended up adding more cream cheese to thicken it up and cut the sugar. I generally don’t like any kind of frosting though. Hubby liked it🥰.
Mary says
I’m glad you like the cupcakes!
CHRISTINE ANN CLAYBAUGH says
Can you use frozen peaches?
Mary says
If you let them thaw and drain, you should be fine. I have not tried it though.
Debbie says
These recieved great reviews when I served them at my daughter’s baby shower. I did need to bake them an additional 5 minutes. The frosting was delish , but I couldn’t get it to a “piping” consistency without an overload of sugar. They were moist and peachy and I would definitely make them again.
Mary says
Thank you for commenting Debbie. Sometimes fruit can have a bit more moisture to it so it makes sense you might have needed a few more minutes. I am glad your group enjoyed them.
Drea says
Ended up really sweet and was almost too caramelized crust. Did enjoy the peach purée and ended up saving some for later use with modification to sweetness level. 👍🏽
Mary says
I’m glad you were able to make it work for you, Drea.
Kay says
I reduced cinnamon to 1/4 tsp and it still overpowered the peach flavor. Cupcakes sank and were gooey, even after adding 15 minutes to the cook time. The batter was gorgeous but this recipe, which I followed precisely other than the slightly reduced cinnamon all went in the trash. I won’t ever try making these again.
Mary says
Sorry to hear that you weren’t a huge fan of the cupcakes, Kay. Hope your next baking project turns out much more successfully.