Thanksgiving Turkey Cupcakes
These easy-to-make turkey cupcakes are absolutely adorable (and delicious)! It’s a great project to do with kids, a fantastic way to use up leftover Halloween candy (and a great excuse to make my favorite chocolate cupcakes and chocolate buttercream), and I guarantee that guests will gobble them up!
Sure, pumpkin pie is traditional and expected on Thanksgiving, and maybe this is just me, but I’ve always felt that Thanksgiving dessert is seriously lacking in the chocolate category! Enter these super cute chocolate turkey cupcakes! Just whip up (or buy) your favorite chocolate cupcakes, and use some candy to create fun little turkey cupcake toppers.
They look so regal sitting up there on the chocolate cupcakes, totally festive and worthy of a Thanksgiving dessert. Plus, these are a perfect project for kids if you have little ones that want to help out in the kitchen. (Or, big kids that love eating discarded pieces of candy!)
Cupcakes and frosting
You can use any of your favorite chocolate cupcake and frosting recipes, or even pick up a dozen from the grocery store or your favorite bakery.
Naturally, I have my favorites! These are my favorites for each:
- Ultimate Chocolate Cupcakes (you can omit the ganache centers to keep it simple)
- My Favorite Chocolate Buttercream Frosting (a single recipe will be enough for this project!)
List of supplies for decorating
Just some candy and colored icing. If you can grab the little tubes from the baking aisle at the grocery store, that’s the easy route to go!
- Oreo cookies
- Whoppers (malt balls)
- Miniature Reese’s peanut butter cups
- Candy corn
- Assorted icing – yellow, white, and red
- Chocolate sprinkles
Step by step directions
So, how do you do this? It’s fairly simple and doesn’t take long at all!
There are detailed instructions in the recipe below, but here is a quick overview:
- Bake and cool the cupcakes, then frost the top of the cupcakes in an even layer of chocolate frosting
- Attach candy corn tip-side-down into the Oreos to make the turkey feathers, then attach another Oreo cookie so the turkeys can sit up.
- Add a mini peanut butter cup (that has a sliver cut off one end) for the body, then add a Whopper for the head.
- Now the little details! Add the beak and eyes, then once those are set, flip it right-side-up and add the feet and gobbler. Place on top of your cupcakes and you’re all done!
Ready-made alternatives
Love the idea of turkey cupcake toppers but don’t want to assemble the candy version? There are super cute and festive versions on Etsy here and here, as well as edible ones on Amazon.
More festive Thanksgiving ideas below:
- 29 Thanksgiving Desserts Worth Saving Room For
- Our Thanksgiving Menu
- Pumpkin Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting
- Sparkling Cranberry White Chocolate Cupcakes
- Pumpkin Spice Latte Cupcakes
If you make these delicious, adorable little turkey cupcakes, please stop back and leave a rating and let me know how you liked them! ENJOY! 😍

Turkey Cupcakes
Ingredients
- 12 chocolate cupcakes
- 1 batch chocolate frosting
- Double Stuf Oreo cookies
- Whoppers
- Miniature peanut butter cups
- Candy corn
- Yellow icing
- Red icing
Instructions
- Bake and cool the cupcakes, then frost the top of the cupcakes in an even layer of chocolate frosting.
- Put a little bit of chocolate frosting around the middle of the Oreos on one end (this helps the candy corn stick a little bit better). Then place 5 pieces of candy corn tip-side-down into the Oreos.
- Put a dab of chocolate frosting on the bottom of the Oreos (on the opposite end from the candy corn). Then place these on top of another Oreo cookie, so they are perpendicular to each other. It helps to have them sitting against a wall or a solid surface so they can set up without falling over. Allow the frosting to set so they stick together.
- Meanwhile, cut a small sliver off one end of your miniature peanut butter cups.
- Flip the cookies over so the candy corn is on the bottom, but keep them pushed up against the wall or your solid surface. Place a dab of frosting on the miniature peanut butter cups and place them on them Oreo cookies so that the ridged part of the peanut butter cup is facing up (the same direction as the candy corn).
- Place a small dab of frosting on both the top of the peanut butter cup and the Oreo cookies and attach a Whopper so that it is touching the frosting on both the peanut butter cup and the Oreo.
- Cut off the tip ends of candy dorn. Add a dab of yellow icing to the middle of the Whopper and attach the candy corn tips for the beaks. Add two yellow dots for the eyes and then a chocolate sprinkle or mini chocolate chips for the center of the eyes.
- Once the beak is secure and set, you can flip the turkeys over. Use icing to draw some little yellow feet. Use red icing to add a gobbler under the turkey's beak. Carefully set them on top of the frosted chocolate cupcakes and serve!
Notes
- Idea from Our Best Bites.
Did you make this recipe?
Leave a review below, then snap a picture and tag @thebrowneyedbaker on Instagram so I can see it!
Photography by Becky Winkler.
Getting ready to make these tomorrow for our church Thanksgiving dinner. Any suggestions on how to transport them without them completely falling apart?? 🤔
These are so cute! I am allergic to peanut butter. Any suggestions what candy I can use other than the pb cups? Thanks! :-)
Hi Kimberly, If you can find mini almond butter or sunbutter cups you can use those! I have bought mini sunbutter cups for the kids, this brand – I’ve also found them at Whole Foods! https://thrivemarket.com/p/chocolove-dark-chocolate-sun-cups-minis?utm_source=google&utm_medium=pla_smart&utm_campaign=Shopping_Engagement_Smart_Members&utm_content=895444001795&utm_term=na&gclid=CjwKCAiA17P9BRB2EiwAMvwNyN3vuIwJ0HJ6OIzdgGAbHy38HxopzRjB-BDOTIkpqyJt0lwnDSTzIxoCZ78QAvD_BwE
I hope that helps!
Wow, the Chew reached out to you. I saw that inbyour comments……What an amazing compliment to you and your blog. I loved that show.
Great tutorial on the turkeys. I may just do a craft with my great niece with your adorable turkey idea. So cute.
It’s sooo delicious. Thanks Michelle! Amazing recipe =)
wow ,so cute.cant wait to try them
Wow, such an amazing recipe. Looking forward to making this recipe on christmas.
Those are so cute!
Thank you!!
It’s called a waddle
Hi,
I work on The Chew on ABC. We may be interested in using one of these turkey cupcake pictures on our show. If you’re interested in giving us permission to use them, please contact me at andrea.l.kail.-nd@abc.com
Made these with my hostkids today – we all loved it and they look super cool. Didn t have enough candycorn so we used Mike & Ike’s candies instead :D
Thanks for the idea!
Anja
These are adorable :D Looks a bit hard to eat, though :P
They r so cute and I was so excited to make them! But I couldn’t get the back cookie to stand up no matter what! Even tried toothpicks. So we adjusted. We had already made cake batter cookies(yum-o!!!) And we just put the Reese’s cup on the cookie and decorated the top of the cookie the same, i guess u could say the turkey was just standing instead of sitting. Still turned out cute. Just need to transport 72 to school tomorrow with a 6 n 9yr old helping. Yikes!
I made these last year and came out so cute! LOVE IT!!!! Thanks :)
I just wanted to thank you for the wonderrful cupcake idea for Thanksgiving. My kids and I had a great time making them after dinner on Thanksgiving. We also enjoyed eating them too! I posted our cupcakes on my blog, Frosted Memories, so check it out: http://frostedmemoriesblog.blogspot.com/2011/11/my-first-christmas.html
Thanks again!
Thanks for sharing this idea. I made a dozen of the turkeys (without the cupcakes) and it took quite a bit of time. The challenging part was getting the icing to dry and hold the parts together. I used Pillsbury icing in a can & it was moist and took a long time to set up. Next time I’ll make my own icing without butter. I’m going to put each one in a cupcake paper & use as decoration on our Thanksgiving dinner table. I hope your family has a Happy Thanksgiving!
Hi Martha, A very Happy Thanksgiving to you and your family as well!
So cute I love them – making them for a little Thanksgiving treat. They are so cute – they are a work of art and probably pretty simple to make. I’m going to run out to the store now and get the ingredients. So excited to make these cute little Turkeys. Amazing idea!
They are so cute. Great way of using up Halloween Candy and cookies. Just adorable.
I love me some pinterest too but this post proves you have far more patience than myself. There would have just been a trail of candy wrappers if I had tried to pull this one off ;)
These are darling & totally pinned :)
My mother and my children made these last year and used them as place cards for the kids table. They turned out so cute and they had such fun making them! Using them as cupcake toppers is certainly taking it to the next level– love it!
Way too cute!!!
These are so adorable!!
Are these for real!? Wow… amazing artistry! I wouldn’t even want to eat them they’re so cute. Fabulous job!!
xo
http://allykayler.blogspot.com
I’m not much into cupcakes, but are these the cutest ones you’ve ever seen OR WHAT?! :)
What a great project for kids! Super cute.
I love these!! So cute!!
yup, this big ol’ kid will love this too… so glad you found this inspiration….
these cupcakes are adorable! i love how you used all {deliciously} edible ingredients to make the toppers! love em!
SO freaking adorable, I’m in love! I really wish I was going to be around for Thanksgiving so make these for my family.
Oh! So cute and perfect activity for some of the kiddos at the Thanksgiving gathering. I’ll have supplies ready and they can assemble…they won’t be as cute as yours, but will keep those kiddos busy. Thanks for the awesome idea.
SO CUTE! I seriously have no patience to make something with so much detail…can you come over? :)
Freaking adorable. Love!
I love these little turkeys. I made some the year before last, but I didn’t put them on cupacakes :) super cute!
Such a cute idea! The kids at our thanksgiving would love these.
For some reason I was expecting to see cupcakes made from turkey meat! What a lovely and delightful surprise. These are adorable.
When I first read this on my rss feed, I thought- eww gross. How can turkey cupcakes be a good thing. I was happily surprised to see cookies and reeses on top of a chocolate cupcake!
Those cupcakes are ADORABLE. Our Thanksgiving is over (Canada) but I want to try making a gluten free version because they’re so cuuute!
These are too cute and they just might have to make an appearance on our Thanksgiving table. Thanks for sharing!
The topping alone makes you want to make this :)
I’ve seen the adorable cookies but it hasn’t occurred to me to put them on cupcakes! How cute!
aw, these are so cute!
I saw the title in my RSS feed and thought, “Oh I hope they don’t really have turkey in them!” Thanks for passing along this cute idea. I’m glad they’re not actually turkey cupcakes. :)
I love these! I pinned them too but then got scared of how time consuming they looked. Might need to do them anyway after seeing how good yours turned out!
Omg, Omg! There so dam cute, dam it! Why do you always show us such wonderful looking treats? Whats sad is I have all those candies left over from Halloween. Now I need to get Oreo’s! How much of a pain in the behind were they putting together? I always attempt to make something pretty like that, and realize I spent 3 hours doing so. lol Yah, I’ll be making these next week!
Oh these are so cute!! The turkey cupcakes title took my attention and I had to look! Well done! They look great!
I am seriously in love with these! So cute!
These are too adorable! Love it.
Wow! These are super cute. Definitely going to make these one day.
Adorable! I made something similar last year!
You gave me a heart attack with that title!!! But on arrival to your page I realize all it is are beautiful cupcakes which need making… Phew
I’ve seen these on Pinterest as well, and always think that they’re so adorable! It doesn’t hurt that I love all the candies involved in making the turkey either :)
Who can resist the fun of making something so cute? Too adorable.
Adorable and appetizing! I want to eat the tops off of all of them and leave the cake behind, LOL.