Lemon and blueberry cupcakes with lemon cream cheese icing

Practice run 2 in preparation for the Cupcake Challenge - lemon and blueberry cupcakes with lemon cream cheese icing.

I really liked these ones. They were moist, fragrant with the lemon, a bit tart from the blueberry and not too sweet. The sweet and tangy cream cheese icing topped them off perfectly - and look how pale the icing is! Yay!

But while they were tasty, they're probably not a cupcake challenge winner. Still, they were pretty moreish and let me practice my atrocious piping skills.



Lemon and blueberry cupcakes

Adapted from this recipe.

Makes 24 small cupcakes

Cupcakes:

1 & 1/2 cups of plain flour + an extra 2 tablespoons
135 grams caster sugar
1 & 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon baking soda
55 grams butter, melted
1 large egg
1/2 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup milk
Finely grated rind of one lemon
3/4 cup fresh or frozen blueberries, thawed

Lemon cream cheese icing:

110g unsalted butter, at room temperature
125g cream cheese, at room temperature
1 cup icing sugar, sifted
2 teaspoons finely grated lemon rind
1 tablespoons lemon juice
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preparation

Preheat oven to 180°C. Grease 2 x 12 cup muffin pans or line the holes with paper cases.

Sift together the 1 & 1/2 cups flour with an additional 1 tablespoon flour and baking powder, and baking soda in a large bowl. Add the caster sugar and salt and mix to combine.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the melted butter and egg. Whisk in the buttermilk, milk, and the lemon rind to the butter mixture.

Add the buttermilk mixture to flour mixture, stirring just until moist. Toss the blueberries with the remaining 1 tablespoon flour and fold the blueberries into tge batter.

Spoon the batter into the prepared cupcake cups - filling about 1/2 way. Bake for approximately 20 minutes or until a wooden skewer inserted in the center comes out clean.

Cool in the pan for 5 minutes, then remove from the pan and cool completely on a wire rack before icing.

Icing:

Beat together the butter and cream cheese until pale and fluffy. Gradually add the icing sugar. Stir in the juice, rind and vanilla extract. Spread or pipe over the cupcakes.