If you came to the festival I hope you enjoyed it!
Click on ‘more’ if you’d like the recipe for the lemon cupcakes I made for the kids’ classes and the main demonstration.
Cupcake Ingredients (makes 10 if you half-fill 2.5″ cases)
1 Egg
160g Caster Sugar (preferably unrefined)
75g Sunflower Oil (or Corn or Groundnut or Vegetable Oil)
85g Low Fat Yogurt
110g Plain Flour
1/2 tsp Salt
1/4 tsp Bicarbonate of Soda
1/4 tsp Baking Powder
Zest of 1 Lemon (NB Juice needed for Buttercream)
Lemon Buttercream Ingredients
125g Unsalted Butter
200g Icing Sugar
Squeeze of Lemon Juice (add according to your taste)
Decoration Ingredients (Suggestion only – let your creativity fly!)
Small edible flowers – eg lavender/rosemary/oregano flowers
Royal icing coloured green (1 egg white mixed with 200-250g icing sugar and beaten until bright white then coloured)
Cake Method
Whisk Egg and Sugar together until light and thick.
Stream the Oil into the mix gradually whilst continuing to mix.
Add the Yoghurt.
Pre-mix the remaining ingredients by hand in another bowl before adding to above and mixing until smooth with your hand (your fingers are best at detecting pockets of un-mixed dry ingredients or lumps).
Put cupcake cases into cupcake/muffin trays and half-fill the cases with your mixture. (Only put in up to three-quarters if you want the cakes to dome above the top).
Bake at 165C for about 20 minutes until they spring back from a light touch. Don’t be tempted to open the oven door until they’ve been baking for 15 minutes and have had a chance to rise and set without loss of temperature or bangs which could make them collapse.
Buttercream Method
Ensure your Butter is soft enough to beat – if it’s come straight from the fridge and you don’t want to risk microwaving it, put it in a plastic bag and whack it with a rolling pin a few times. It will soon soften up!
For nicely toned arms, beat the Butter with a wooden spoon (or use a mixer) and add one third of the Icing Sugar. Mix then beat before adding the next third along with a good squeeze of Lemon Juice (don’t overdo it though!). Mix and beat that then add the last third. Incorporate as much air as you can as that will increase the volume and at the same time make the cupcakes less sickly. Pipe or spread onto your cupcakes when they are completely cooled.
Decorate as you think fit - best to do the final decoration the day the cakes are eaten (otherwise icings and decorations can merge into eachother and colours migrate from their intended position!). The cakes (just buttercreamed) will keep (covered) for a week or so. They look brilliant in a cake stand with a dome whilst they wait to be eaten - Ikea do a nice one for £9.99 if you’re not lucky enough to find one in a charity shop like I was!
If you like the decoration on the cakes in the photo, I explain how the flowers are made here.