Bakers Formula: April 2015

This recipe comes from Jennifer Palmer, owner/operator of Jennifer’s Cakes in London, United Kingdom.

“Tradition is of the upmost importance in my bakery,” she says. “With that said, Tangy Lemon Cupcakes with Lemon Butter Cream is certainly up there with my most traditional flavours of cake that we sell at Jennifer’s Cakes. It also happens to be my favourite flavour.”

Ingredients:

• 150g plain flour
• 125g butter (at room temperature)
• 125g caster sugar
• 2 free-range organic eggs
• 1 tsp baking powder
• Grated zest of 1 lemon
• Pinch of salt

Butter Cream:

• 500g icing sugar
• 250g butter (unsalted at room temperature)
• Grated zest of 1 lemon
• 4 tsp lemon juice
• Yellow gel food colouring

Method:

• Preheat your oven to 180 C and line a cupcake baking tray with paper cupcake liners.
• In a clean, dry bowl add your butter and beat continuously for 5 minutes, until the butter becomes fully aerated and turns from a yellow colour to a pale cream colour.
• Once this colour change occurs, add in your sugar and beat again until it becomes fully incorporated.
• Now, add in your eggs one at a time, ensuring that each egg has been taken up in the mixture before the next addition of egg.
• Once all of your eggs have been added to the mixture, add in your lemon zest and mix again
• In a separate bowl, add in your flour, salt and baking powder and stir with a spoon.
• Now, add your dry flour mixture to your wet egg mixture 1/3 at a time, ensuring that the 1/3 has been taken up by the mixture before the next 1/3 is added.
• Once all of your ingredients have been mixed together, spoon your batter into the cupcake liners until they are 2/3 full. This will leave enough space for your cupcakes to rise in the oven during the baking process without any over spill.
• Place your cupcake batter into the oven and leave to bake for 20 minutes.
• To check if your cupcakes are ready, apply a little pressure to the centre of each cupcake and if it springs back to the touch, then your cupcakes are ready to be removed from the oven.
• Remove you cupcakes from the oven and leave to stand in the cupcake baking tin for 5 minutes.
• Once these 5 minutes are over, remove the cupcakes from the baking tin and leave to stand on a wire cooling rack until they have cooled fully.
• While your cupcakes are cooling, this will leave you ample time to create your lemon butter cream icing.
• In a clean dry bowl add your butter and beat for 5 minutes until the colour changes from a yellow colour to a pale cream colour.
• Once the colour change occurs, add in the icing sugar a table spoon at a time, DO NOT use an electric mixer unless you have a guard as the icing sugar will end up all over the kitchen instead of in your butter cream.
• Once all of the icing sugar has been added and beaten into the butter, add in your lemon juice, zest and beat again.
• Add in your yellow food colouring and beat until the colour becomes smooth, without a marbling effect and pipe onto your cupcakes.

If you would like to see more of Palmer’s delicious cupcake and cake recipes, please visit jenniferscakes.co.uk.