Lemon Cupcakes with Lemon Icing

Posted on July 20, 2008 by kitchenbelle

 

I was set on making fruit-flavored cupcakes and I hemmed and hawed over which fruit flavor for longer than anyone should hem and haw about fruit-flavored cupcakes, or anything fruit-related for that matter.  I considered orange, lime, pineapple, apple, watermelon and even grape.  I even considered different combinations of frosting and cake–lemon cake with lime frosting, orange cake with lemon frosting, vanilla cake with pineapple frosting.  I think the heat was getting to me–I almost forgot I do have more important things to think about!   Before spiralling too far into a fruit-salad hysteria I took a cold shower.  It was then that I settled on crisp, simple, refreshing: lemon.  And I am happy with the decision.  The cake was nice and fluffy with just the right amount of lemon flavor.  The icing was smooth and sweet–nicely balanced by the tartness of the lemon.    

 

Lemon Cupcakes:

  • 2 sticks unsalted butter
  • 2 cups granulated sugar
  • 4 large eggs, at room temperature
  • 3 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 cup milk
  • lemon zest of 2 lemons
  • lemon juice of 2 lemons

Preheat over to 325 degrees.  Insert liners into 2 cupcake pans.  In a large bowl cream together butter and sugar with an electric mixer until fluffy, about 3 minutes.  Add the eggs one at a time to creamed mixture, beating 1 minute after each addition.

In a separate bowl combine flour, baking soda, and salt.

Add the dry ingredients to the creamed mixure, alternating with the milk.  Add the lemon zest and lemon juice.  Mix until incorporated.

Fill the cupcake liners 3/4 full.  Bake for 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of a cupcake comes out clean.

Lemon Icing:

  • 4 cups confectioners’ sugar
  • 1 stick unsalted butter (softened)
  • zest of one lemon
  • juice of one lemon

In a large bowl cream together sugar and butter with an electric mixer until smooth.  Mix in the lemon zest and lemon juice.  Spread over cooled cupcakes. 

Lemon cupcake recipe and lemon icing recipe adapted from Crazy About Cupcakes by Krystina Castella.

Filed under: cupcakes, Dessert, icing, lemon | 8 Comments »

Irish Cream Cupcakes with Milk Chocolate Glaze

Posted on July 14, 2008 by kitchenbelle

 I would not be honest if I didn’t tell you I was in quite a rush when I made these cupcakes!  They were a last minute decision and I made them using ingredients already in my cupboards.  Nonetheless, I think they came out pretty well.  The Irish Cream flavor was strong but not overbearing.  Next time I think I will try frosting with a vanilla buttercream instead of the chocolate glaze, but time was not on my side (that seems to be a theme on this blog!) and I went with a simple chocolate glaze. 

I think these would be great for St. Patty’s day, especially with some shamrock embelishments.   

Irish Cream Cupcakes:

  • 2/3 cup unsalted butter at room temperature (I used salted)
  • 2 cups sugar
  • 2 large eggs at room temperature
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 2/3 cup milk
  • 1 1/3 cups Irish Cream Liquor (I used Bailey’s)
  • 4 cups of flour
  • 2 tsp salt
  • 2 tsp baking powder

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.  Insert liners into cupcake pan.  In a large bowl cream together sugar and butter.  Add the vanilla and eggs.  Beat well.  In another bowl, mix together flour, baking powder and salt.  In a third bowl mix Irish Cream with milk.  Add the flour mixture to the creamed mixture alternating with the liquid mixture, starting and ending with the flour mixture. Beat on medium speed for two minutes.  Fill the cupcake papers 3/4 full.  Bake for about 20 minutes.  Cool cupcakes in pan.  Makes 24 cupcakes.

Milk Chocolate Glaze:

  • whipping cream
  • coarsely chopped milk chocolate*

Heat the whipping cream until it is bubbling but not boiling.  Remove it from the stove and add the chopped up chocolate.  Whisk cream and chocolate together.  Add more cream or chocolate to reach desired consistency.  After the cupcakes cooled I drizzled the glaze over each.

*I was low on milk chocolate chips so I used a solid Godiva chocolate bunny that I have been holding on to!  Talk about improvising–haha!  I did feel bad watching his paws melt, but there was no time to run to the store!

Irish Cream Cupcakes adapted from Crazy about Cupcakes by Krystina Castella

Milk Chocolate Glaze adapted from Cupcakes! by Elinor Klivans

Filed under: chocolate, cupcakes, Dessert, icing, Irish Cream | 1 Comment »

Root Beer Iced Vanilla Cake

Posted on June 24, 2008 by kitchenbelle

My dad loooooves root beer, so for his birthday I wanted to honor his favorite treat.  In addition to serving A&W root beer floats, I decided to make a root beer iced cake.  I confess I used a boxed mix for the vanilla cake because I wanted to spend more time on the decorating, and I was short on time as it was.  So I baked a double vanilla sheet cake and spent the rest of my energy on the decorating!  Little did I know how much energy it would take!  In the end it was all worth it and my dad loooooved his root beer iced cake.  (As did everyone else at the dinner party!)

Root beer Icing (the recipe actually calls it frosting, but I found the consistency to be much more like icing):

  • 1 3/4 cups confectioner’s sugar
  • 1/4 cup unsalted butter at room temp
  • 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 6 tablespoons root beer

Gradually add the confectioners’ sugar to butter until well mixed.  Add the vanilla and root beer.  Add more root beer or confectioners’ sugar until you reach the desired spreading consistency.

I made the mistake of adding too much liquid and therefore had to run to the store mid-mixing to get more sugar.  Then I added too much sugar and had to add more liquid.  I went back and forth like this for a bit until I had as much as a needed at the correct consistency!  It ended up a nice light beige color.

I wanted to crush root beer barrels and sprinkle those on top–at this point little I did I know how much trouble I would have (a) finding root beer barrels and (b) crushing them.  After running around to several stores I finally found them at CVS.  They are quite a bit harder than I expected and crushing them with a meat tenderizer in a plastic bag was not an easy task.  The barrels were the consitency of marbles and when smashed, the sharp pieces poked holes in the bag allowing root beer dust to pour out and create a lovely sticky mess! I eventually did end up with enough crushed barrels to sprinkle on the top of the cake.  I then lined the edge of the cake with piped plain vanilla frosting, just to finish it off.  I also topped it off with some really cute gummy cola bottles. As I said, in the end it worked out well and this cake was a huge hit!

Icing/frosting recipe adapted from Crazy About Cupcakes by Krystina Castella.

Filed under: Dessert, icing, root beer | 4 Comments »

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