It was girl's night out again, and I was bringing dessert.
I love to tempt folks with recipes that they may not otherwise find at the typical grocery store....chocolate cupcakes with chocolate buttercream frosting may be good, but one can find those anywhere.
I thought of what I had in the kitchen...hmm, lemons are good....lemon cupcakes, even better. I have made lemon meringue cupcakes that are delicious, but I wanted to try something new.
What tastes great with lemon? Raspberries! I Googled "lemon raspberry cupcakes" and came up with a few recipes. The one I liked most had lemon cake, lemon butter cream frosting, and raspberry curd.
Raspberry curd? I'd never heard of that! Lemon curd is recognizable here in the States as that yummy filling of lemon meringue pie, but I'd never thought of using berries of any sort to make the same kind of filling. I could see by the recipe that it wasn't difficult to make, and didn't require any odd ingredients. Perfect!
I decided to follow some of my own recipes, and use the curd recipe I'd found online. ( I tried for the life of me to create a link to the website for you, but I cannot get it to load! The website is this: www.smells-like-home.com, and you'll find the recipe under May 2012. My apologies to that blog's creator!)
This is my finished product::
First, you'll make the curd because that needs to be completely cool. You can even make it a couple of days ahead if you like. My apologies for not taking multiple photos of the process, but below you can see the end result of pressing the cooked curd through a sieve to get rid of the seeds:
And this is the cooked, deseeded curd, a mixture of butter, egg yolks, sugar, lemon juice and raspberries:
You'll want to cover this and put it in the fridge to cool completely. It will thicken up a bit more when it's cool.
As this was the first time I'd made raspberry curd, I wasn't exactly sure when to tell it was ready to take off the burner. I do wish I'd cooked it a little longer to see if it would thicken some more, or maybe add a bit of cornstarch (like I do for lemon meringue filling). Still, it worked out okay!
For those of you able to locate the original recipe, you'll notice that I made a different cake and frosting recipe. I have my own for vanilla cupcakes that I've adapted from the Sprinkles strawberry cupcake recipe (and that recipe is delicious as it is, but I omit the strawberries and use less sugar!)
You'll need lemon zest. This is the yellow part only of the rind, and a lemon zester really helps with that:
Mix the flour, baking powder, salt, and lemon zest together:
Cream the butter and sugar:
Add the egg yolks and egg whites:
Add the vanilla to the milk, then add the flour and milk to the creamed butter and sugar mixture, a little at a time:
As you can see, the final batter is quite thick! Yum!
Scoop the batter into cupcake tins; ice cream scoops are great for this task!
Use a paring knife or vegetable peeler (the pointy end!) to cut little holes from the tops of the cupcakes. You can take of a little of the cake off the bottom of those cones if you want:
Fill those holes with the cooled raspberry curd:
and put the tops back on!
Now make the frosting. I didn't take any pictures of that process, sorry! I did, however, take this nice shot to tease you all with:
I didn't have any raspberries left over, or I would have decorated the tops of these yummy treats with a fresh raspberry. They'll just have to do as they are!
Enjoy!
Before I give you the recipe, let me discuss a little about the ingredients. I use real, whole food products whenever I can, because I believe that if we are incorporating these yummy treats into our diet in small amounts, we should be enjoying the foods as God intended them to come to us! No cow ever produced non-fat milk, and margarine is two steps away from plastic! Yuck!
Plus, whole milk, real butter, etc., affects the final product, called "mouth-feel" in the case of cake. You'll have better tasting food, and the cake will be more tender than if you used non-fat or even low-fat dairy products. Yes, you can use what you like, and it will still be a cupcake, but not the same as mine! ;-)
I don't pretend that this is healthy, and I'm sure arguments can be made about how God didn't intend for powdered sugar to exist in any form and how even unbleached all-purpose flour is a long way from whole-grain flour, but there ya go!
Now, here's the recipe as I made it:
Lemon Cupcakes with Raspberry Curd Filling and Lemon Buttercream Frosting
makes 24
Raspberry curd
- 8 Tbs unsalted butter
- 1 pint raspberries (2 of those small plastic clamshell boxes)
- 5 large egg yolks, lightly beaten
- 3/4 cup sugar
- pinch of salt
- 2-3 tsp. fresh lemon juice
Melt the butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the raspberries, sugar and salt, and stir until blended. Temper the egg yolks by adding a little of the hot raspberry-sugar mixture into the egg yolks, then add all the yolks back into the raspberry-sugar mixture in the saucepan. Stir frequently until the mixture boils, then constantly until thickened, about 10 minutes. Set a sieve or coarse strainer over a bowl and pour the raspberry mixture into the sieve, then press down with the back of a spoon to force the curd into the bowl below, leaving behind the seeds. Stir in lemon juice to taste, cover, and put curd into the refrigerator to cool. Can be made up to 3 days in advance.
Lemon Cupcakes
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp. baking powder
- 2 Tbs lemon zest
- 1/2 tsp. coarse salt
- 1 cup whole milk
- 2 tsp. vanilla
- 1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
- 1 3/4 cups sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 4 egg whites
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line cupcake tins with 24 cupcake liners.
Whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt and lemon zest in a medium bowl; set aside.
Add vanilla to milk; set aside.
In large mixing bowl, cream butter until light. Add sugar, a little at a time until light and fluffy. Add whole eggs and egg whites, blending until just mixed together.
Add about half the flour mixture and just blend, then add half the milk mixture. Scrape down sides of bowl, then add the rest of the flour, and then the milk, scraping again as needed.
Divide batter among cupcake cups. Bake for about 22-25 minutes, or until the tops of the cupcakes are just dry to the touch. Transfer cupcakes from tins to a wire rack and let cool completely.
Lemon Buttercream Frosting
- 2 cups unsalted butter
- pinch of coarse salt
- 7 cups of powdered sugar
- 1 tsp. lemon juice, or more if needed to achieve correct consistency
- 2 Tbs. lemon zest
Cream butter and salt until light and fluffy. Add powdered sugar, one cup at a time, until all is blended, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Add lemon juice and zest, mixing completely. Add more lemon juice (or milk if you don't have more juice) to achieve desired consistency for frosting. You want it to be thick and dense, not too airy (which can happen if you over-mix it).
To finish cupcakes:
Cut a small hole in the tops of the cupcakes and spoon in the raspberry curd, then replace the tops of the cupcakes. Frost and decorate as desired. Enjoy!
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