End of the rainbow cupcakes are as fun to make as they are to eat

Your St. Patrick’s Day just got a little luckier — these pot o’ gold cupcakes are as cute as they are delicious. A colorful cupcake made with marshmallows, sweet-and-sour rope candy and heaps of frosting is exactly what you’d hope to find at the end of the rainbow.

If you aren’t a huge fan of green but still want a festive St. Patrick’s Day recipe, these cupcakes are perfect for you. Even if you don’t find a pot of gold at the end of these rainbows, you still get a sweet, tasty treat.

To make these cupcakes, I used a yellow boxed mix. If you want, you can use your favorite cupcake recipe, but the box mixes are quick and easy.

You start by preparing the cake mix according to the package directions. Then the batter gets evenly separated into three different bowls to get dyed.

These cupcakes not only have a rainbow on top — they are rainbow-colored themselves.

One bowl gets dyed yellow, the next orange and the last red.

Line a cupcake tray with cupcake liners, and don’t forget to heat the oven.

I used a cookie scoop to scoop red batter down first. Next, scoop the orange batter right on top of the red, and finally, scoop the yellow batter on top.

The cupcake liners should be three-quarters full. The cupcakes go into the oven and are baked according to the package directions or until a toothpick inserted in the centers comes out clean.

Once the cupcakes are finished baking and completely cooled, the decorating can begin.

Separate a frosting container into two bowls. One gets dyed blue, and the other stays white. The blue frosting gets frosted on the cupcakes with a butter knife. The white frosting gets piped on using a star tip.

Insert each end of the rainbow candy into the white frosting “clouds.” To make the clouds more prominent, place miniature marshmallows on top of the white frosting.

Rainbow cupcake recipe

Serves 14 – 16

Ingredients:

• 1 (15.25-ounce) yellow cake mix, plus ingredients called for on the package
• 1 container vanilla frosting
• 1 (4.5-ounce) package Airheads Xtremes Sweetly Sour Candy — Rainbow Berry
• 1 bag miniature marshmallows
• Red, orange, yellow and blue food dye

Directions:

1. Heat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a cupcake tray with liners, and set aside.
2. Prepare the cake mix according to the package directions.
3. Separate the prepared cake mix evenly into 3 different bowls.
4. Dye the mix in 1 of the bowls red, another bowl orange and the last bowl yellow.
5. Using a cookie scoop, scoop the red mix into the bottom of all the cupcake liners.
6. Top with a scoop of orange and then a scoop of yellow.
7. Bake, and let cool completely.
8. Separate the tub of frosting into 2. Dye 1 of the halves blue, and put the other half into a frosting bag with a star tip.
9. Frost the cupcakes with the blue frosting.
10. Pipe on the white frosting in small circles.
11. Attach the rainbow candies to the cupcakes by inserting each side into the white frosting.
12. Cover the white frosting with miniature marshmallows.

More St. Patrick’s Day Recipes

Boozy shamrock shake
Stuffed St. Patrick’s Day Funfetti cupcakes
St. Patrick’s Day classroom treats

Updated by Bethany Ramos on 3/1/16