Can You Freeze Cupcake Batter?

3 minutes

When making cakes, getting your quantities right can be a right pain. Before you know it, you’ve got far too much batter and not enough baking tins. So, what do you do with the leftovers?

How to Freeze Cupcake Batter

Unfortunately, freezing cupcake batter isn’t as simple as spooning it into a Tupperware container and popping it into the freezer. There are a few vital steps we’ve found you’ll want to take:

1. Make the Batter: Making the batter is the obvious first step, but ensure you don’t add baking powder or baking soda to the batter itself. These raising agents will not work if they’ve been sat in cake batter for a long time, so you need to add them shortly before baking the cakes.
2. Decant: Moving the batter into airtight containers will ensure that it maintains its flavour over time rather than soaking up the aroma of your freezer. In turn, this should lead to tastier cupcakes.
3. Seal: Sealing the containers tightly will ensure you don’t spill cupcake batter in your freezer. Considering most cake batter contains butter and sugar, a spillage can be a nightmare to clean up!
4. Freeze: Freeze the sealed containers in the centre of your freezer, where they will be as far as possible from the frost front that forms at the edges of the freezer.

3 Tips for Freezing Cupcake Batter

Now you know how to freeze it, we’ve got our 3 top tips which we strongly recommend following when freezing cupcake batter to have the best results:

Avoid Raising Agents
Making cupcakes requires a good rise, and if the raising agent isn’t working, then the cakes won’t rise. Baking powder and baking soda won’t work if you sit them in cake batter for over an hour, so freezing them long-term is out. Ensure you don’t add the raising agent to your batter before freezing. 

Re-Mix
Lecithin is an ingredient within egg yolks that often serves to emulsify batter before baking. If your cupcake batter contains this or a similar emulsifier, it may split during freezing, making you need to remix everything after it has been thawed.

Avoid Recipes With Water
An easy way to damage the batter that you’re working with is for water to expand and separate from the other ingredients during freezing. Avoid this impact by simply not putting water into your cupcake batter. 

How Long Can You Freeze Cupcake Batter?

You can freeze cupcake batter for up to 3 months before you might start to notice a degradation in the quality of the batter.

This degradation will generally be when the batter becomes a little thinner. This happens as the water and fat in the batter separate in the freezer, and need to be recombined by thoroughly mixing them.

How Do You Defrost Cupcake Batter?

You can defrost cupcake batter quickly by sitting it on the side for a few hours or in the fridge overnight.

This will allow the batter to thaw slowly over time and then come to a safe storage temperature after it’s thawed.

Once it’s thawed, add the baking powder or baking soda before mixing thoroughly to ensure there are no lumps, and bake according to the recipe you’re using.

Can You Refreeze Cupcake Batter?

Technically, yes, you can refreeze cake batter.

This is because the batter is unlikely to develop unsafe bacteria while thawed, which would lead to an item you cannot put back into your freezer.

However, we would advise against it. After repeatedly freezing and thawing the batter, it’s likely the carbohydrates in the flour will start to become damaged since they’re so hydrated, leading to a decrease in the overall texture.

Does Cupcake Batter Freeze Well?

Yes, cupcake batter does freeze well.

Provided you ensure no raising agent in the cupcake batter, it’s sure to freeze effectively and work well to make cupcakes after thawing.

Related FAQs

If you’ve still got questions about freezing cupcake batter or cupcakes in general, then these may help: