Saturday, November 19, 2011

There's Nothing Cuter Than A Cupcake!

I love a perfectly frosted cupcake. There are beautiful cakes and delicious looking pies and tarts, but nothing beats a cupcake for me.

I had the cupcake itch earlier this week and Matt suggested lemon raspberry cupcakes (his favorite combination). I really wanted to do a black forest cupcake, but I decided on the lemon/rasp. I'm a good wife like that ;).

For the decoration I wanted to do something other then just flowers, pearls or dragees. I thought it would look nice and simple to make candied lemon peel and use that for decoration.

Candied Lemon Peel

You will need:

  • 3 lemons
  • 2 cups water
  • 2 cups sugar
Peel your lemons with a veggie peeler, make sure to not peel any of the pith (white sour part under the peel).


Meanwhile, bring your 2 cups of water to a boil. When it's reached a boil, add the lemon peels and boil for about 5 minutes, or until tender. Remove the peels and add in your 2 cups of sugar. Once it has returned to a boil, add the lemon peels back in and boil until translucent. Mine could have been cooked a little while longer maybe. Remove the peels and let dry completely before storing. I sprinkled them with some additional sugar to give them a little extra sparkle.


The syrup can be save and used as lemon simple syrup for recipes or cocktails. I grabbed an empty liqueur bottle, washed it out and funneled the syrup into it after it had cooled for a while. That night I made a lemon drop cocktail. Yum!


Source: allrecipes.com

On to the cupcakes! I just made a box recipe of lemon cupcakes. After they had cooled, I took my tip #230 and filled a pastry bag with raspberry jam. I was nervous about exploding one or two of them but thankfully that didn't happen. It was pretty easy to see the cupcake rise a little as it was filling out with the jam.


Here they are, all filled and ready to be frosted!


I used the Wilton butter cream recipe. Normally I use shortening and water, but I had some softened unsalted butter so I made one batch with butter and milk and a second with shortening and milk. I think the milk gives it a better flavor than the water, but to be honest I prefer the shortening to butter. I just whipped the two batches together at the end.


Cupcakes are just so happy to me:).


I sprinkled some Wilton white sparkling sugar on the cupcakes and then topped them each with a candied lemon peel.


"Eat Me!" 
I will edit this post later today. Matt's going to eat one before we take them to the party and I'll post a picture of it cut in half to see what the filling looks like from the inside.


Here's a picture of the cupcake cut down the center. Matt gives them 2 thumbs up.


8 comments:

  1. You could also melt raspberry jam, sieve it and drizzle on top to get a visual of both flavors. They look yummy and I am very tempted seeing as how they are in my refrigerator!

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  2. ohhhhhhhhhhhh drizzle!!!!! ;) hehe hope you see that girls!

    these look so delish! good job allison :)!!!!

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  3. I was thinking of buying fresh raspberries and putting one on top of them but I like your idea better.

    That's also a much cheaper idea lol. Raspberries are so stinkin' expensive this time of year, and I already have the jam from the filling.

    Next time!

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  4. Looks delish and gorgeous Allison. Drizzle me Tab! ;)

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  5. Did Steph see these yet!??!
    What a good idea with the lemon peel!

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  6. Thanks everyone!
    Is lemon/raspberry Stephs favorite or something? I don't know if she's seen it or not.

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  7. um I just saw this and yea lemon and raspberry are my two favorite flavors!!! Ill give you a dollar for one of those.

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  8. Sorry Steph, lemon and raspberry are my favorites too, and I ate them all.

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