4th of July Patriotic Swirled Cupcakes

How is July here already?!?! Though I feel like time flies away before I can see it’s wings growing, I am so excited the 4th of July is here! This is my favorite holiday (barring Christmas of course) because of how fun, festive, and patriotic it is! I love America and am so thankful for the freedom we have to enjoy. My family usually spends the holiday taking the kids to the downtown parade, having a backyard BBQ, and setting off fireworks with friends. So to help celebrate America’s birthday I am making patriotic swirled cupcakes! 

To make the swirled buttercream, you will need a special nozzle called the Wilton Color Swirl. It is a special nozzle that allows you to clip together three separate colors of buttercream. I like this method better than trying to smear the different colors into the same piping bag because it is a lot less messy and you can refill the buttercream so you get consistent coloring on the entire batch of cupcakes. The package also comes with two decorating tips and several oversized piping bags. You can find them at Walmart or Joann’s Fabrics for $8, but right now they are less than $5 on Amazon! 

First, separate the three parts of the nozzle and place them inside their own piping bag. Cut off the end of the piping bag so that the threads of the nozzle are outside the bag. Make sure the nozzles are set in tightly.

Clip all three EMPTY bags together and then secure the tip with the purple screw. It is so much easier clipping the bags together BEFORE they are full of buttercream. Trust me on this one! I have spent way too many hours trying to clean up sticky buttercream! If you need a good recipe for buttercream, you can get mine here.

Then fill the bags with your three different colors of buttercream. Twist the top of the piping bag shut and squeeze the frosting down the bags until you see a little bit come out the tip. Do a test squeeze on a piece of wax paper to make sure you are applying an equal amount of pressure on each color. Set out all your cupcakes so you can move down a line. It’s a lot easier than starting and stopping over and over again as you reach for a cupcake.

To make the rosette look, pretend you are making a lower case “e” on top of the cupcake. Start with a strip in the middle from left to right.

Then swirl around the top of your line making the top of your “e.” Finish in the same spot you started.

Look at those beautiful patriotic colors! This is such a fun tool to use because you can use any color known to man and any tip you have on hand.

I used this same Wilton Color Swirl Kit to make these poop emojis for a customer a few months back. I handed them off to the little 6 year old and she informed me that these were not poop emojis, but rather unicorn poop. Who knew there were some many kinds of popp!? Boy, I’m glad I got that issue cleared up! You can see even more of my cupcakes and cakes on my Heidi’s Home Cooking Facebook Page.

Enough about poop, back to our regularly scheduled program: swirled cupcakes! If you have a party on Wednesday, you could whip these up in no time!

If you use a box mix to make your cupcakes, they will easily stay good in the fridge for 2 or 3 days. So these swirled cupcakes are a great option for a make-ahead dessert for any holiday or birthday party. They also freeze and defrost well…without the buttercream on top of course.

I hope these swirled cupcakes will make your 4th of July even more patriotic! Do you have the rest of your menu planned out already? If not, here are my 13 Best Summer BBQ and Potluck Recipes as well as 6 Delicious Desserts for the 4th of July.

Happy Birthday America! Though you deserve a whole lot more than 2 dozen patriotic swirled cupcakes, we celebrate and honor you today!