Southern-Style Strawberry Cream Cheese Cupcakes

These super yummy cupcakes are wonderful and almost easy to make! It just takes a little effort. But these, by far, have been everyone's favorite!

Yields 36 cupcakes

Ingredients for the Cupcakes

• 1 (18.25 oz) box white cake mix
• 1 (3 oz) box strawberry flavored instant gelatin (I picked up the Jello brand and ended up using only half of the box)
• 1 (15 oz) package of frozen strawberries IN SYRUP!, thawed & pureed (I actually picked up about 30 oz because you'll use some of the strawberry puree for your icing)
• 4 large eggs
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1/4 cup water

Ingredients for the Icing

• 1/4 cup butter, room temp/softened
• 1 (8 oz) package cream cheese room temp/softened
• 1/4 cup strawberry puree (Remember the extra you saved from the cupcakes? Use it here!)
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• Up to 7 cups confectioners' sugar (Yeah, I said up to 7. I'm not exaggerating.)
• OPTIONAL: Strawberry slices for garnish (Pssh, who needs garnish? I don't!)

So here's what you do:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line your muffin tins with cupcake papers.
2. In a large bowl, combine cake mix and gelatin.
3. Add pureed strawberries, eggs, oil and water; beat at medium speed with an electric mixer until smooth.
4. Divide the batter evenly among the cupcake tins. (Be careful not to over fill!)
   
5. Bake for 20 minutes but make sure to keep an eye on them at about the 15 minute mark.

For your frosting:

1. In a large bowl, beat butter and cream cheese at medium speed with your electric mixer until creamy and sort of light looking.
2. Beat in your leftover puree and the vanilla extract.
3. Gradually add in confectioners' sugar, one cup at a time, until smooth. You're adding in the confectioners' sugar to thicken up your frosting. So if it's not thick enough for you, add confectioners' sugar until it is.
4. I added a little bit of red food coloring to my frosting to get it that pink color. That is something that is also optional.
   

Wait until your cupcakes have completely cooled (aka room temperature) before you attempt to put frosting on them. Otherwise, your icing is going to melt and just run all over your cupcakes and become a huge mess.

ENJOY!