Cakes

Lemon Ricotta Cupcakes with Lemon Curd Filling and Lavender Frosting

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Also pictured: Butterbeer Cupcakes

Lemon Curd Ingredients

  • 3 tablespoons plus 1 1/2 teaspoons sugar
  • 3 tablespoons lemon juice
  • 4 1/2 teaspoons butter
  • 1 large egg, lightly beaten, at room temperature
  • 1 teaspoon grated lemon zest

(I doubled this recipe to make sure I would have enough filling.)

Cupcake Ingredients

  • 1 1/2 cups cake flour
  • 1 cup granulated sugar
  • 2 teaspoons lemon zest
  • 2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1 stick/4 oz. unsalted butter, softened
  • 1/2 tablespoon vanilla extract
  • 2 large eggs, at room temperature
  • 1/2 cup whole milk ricotta cheese (homemade ricotta cheese recipe coming soon)
  • 1/4 cup whole milk
  • 1 1/2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

Lavender Frosting Ingredients

  • 3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
  • 3 1/2 cups to 4 cups powdered sugar
  • 1 teaspoon dried culinary lavender, crushed with a mortar and pestle
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 tablespoon milk or cream, if needed
  • 1 drop purple food coloring (I used the Violet gel color from Hobby Lobby)
  • Fresh lavender, sugared lemon slices and edible pearls for garnish, optional

Directions

  1. In a saucepan, cook and stir the sugar, lemon juice and butter until smooth. Stir a small amount of the hot mixture into the lightly beaten egg. Stir well and return all to the pan. Bring to a low boil, stirring constantly. Cook 2 minutes longer or until thickened. Stir in lemon zest. Cool for 10 minutes. Cover and completely chill in the fridge.
  2. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line a 12 cupcake baking tin.
  3. Mix all of the dry ingredients together in a large bowl. Add the softened butter and vanilla. Beat with a hand mixer or stand mixer until well combined. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each one. Add ricotta, milk and lemon juice and mix until combined.
  4. Spoon the batter into cupcake tins, filling each one about 3/4 full. Bake for 16-20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle of the cupcakes comes out clean. Rotate the cupcake tin half-way through baking if necessary. Cool completely.
  5. Using a cupcake corer remove the middle of the cupcake. Using a small spoon, fill the holes in each cupcake with a generous amount of lemon curd.
  6. For the frosting you can use a hand mixer or a stand mixer. Add butter to a large bowl and beat until creamy. On low speed, gradually add the powdered sugar and lavender to the bowl. Increase the speed and beat until fluffy and combined. Beat in the vanilla extract. If the frosting is too thick, add the cream or milk. If it is too runny add more powdered sugar a little bit at a time. Use one drop of purple food coloring. The Violet color was a little lighter so I used two drops.
  7. Put desired frosting tip into a piping bag. Add frosting to the bag and frost the cupcakes. Top with edible pearls and small lavender sprigs. Thinly slice lemons into halves and coat both sides with sugar. Place lemons on top of frosted cupcakes.

These were a lot of fun to make and they tasted great! The flavor combination was delightful! I took them to work and they were gone in an instant. I knew the Butterbeer cupcakes were going to go fast because they had been asking me to make them again, but I wasn’t sure how they would respond to the lemon ricotta and lavender. I was pleasantly surprised when those disappeared, too. 🙂

Butterbeer Cupcakes

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Cupcake Ingredients

  • 2 cups flour
  • 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1/2 cup dark brown sugar, packed
  • 3 large eggs
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
  • 1 teaspoon butter extract
  • 1/2 cup buttermilk
  • 1/2 cup cream soda

Ganache Ingredients

  • 1 11 oz. package butterscotch chips
  • 1 cup heavy cream

Frosting Ingredients

  • 1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
  • 1/3 cup butterscotch ganache
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1 16 oz package powdered sugar
  • 1 tablespoon heavy cream

Directions

  1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and line cupcake pans with liners. (Makes 18) Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a bowl and set aside.
  2. In a large bowl, cream butter until light and fluffy (this can be done with a handheld mixer or a stand mixer – if using a stand mixer make sure you are regularly scraping the bottom of the bowl). Add sugars and beat until well combined. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Beat in vanilla and butter extract.
  3. Alternate adding buttermilk, cream soda and dry ingredients. Beat until combined – this is where the stand mixer comes in handy. (I’ve heard you are supposed to start and end with the dry ingredients, but not sure that actually matters)
  4. Fill each cupcake liner 3/4 full. Bake 15-17 minutes, rotating the baking pans half-way through so that the cupcakes in the back are then in the front. (This needs to be done in my oven anyway). A toothpick inserted in the center should come out clean. Cool completely on wire racks.
  5. In a double boiler (I just use a sauce pan and a large metal mixing bowl), combine butterscotch chips and cream. Stir until completely combined and smooth. Cool to room temperature.
  6. Fill a squeeze bottle with ganache and insert into center and squeeze until filling begins to overflow. (This method only really works if the ganache is still a little warm and runny. It seeps into the cake. When it is completely cooled, not nearly enough ganache gets into the cupcake. If you are going to cool the ganache to room temperature you will need to core out the center of the cupcake and then squeeze in the ganache with the bottle)
  7. For the frosting, cream butter until fluffy. Add in ganache, vanilla, butter extract and salt. Mix until well combined. Beat in powdered sugar 1 cup at a time until reaching desired consistency. Add cream by the tablespoon if needed. (Honestly, without specific instructions I wasn’t sure what to do here. I ended up using 1 tablespoon of cream and 2 cups of powdered sugar. It tasted ok to me, and then I had several people tell me they don’t normally like frosting, but they liked it this way. And my husband liked it and that’s a miracle!)
  8. Frost cupcakes and drizzle with butterscotch ganache. I also sprinkled them with edible gold stars (Hobby Lobby)

These cupcakes are amazing!!!!!!! I have had this recipe for 10 years and never made it until now, but I am glad I finally did. You can’t eat just one – they are that good. I am about to make my third batch next week because people keep asking for them! So good!

Honey Pineapple Upside Down Cake

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Ingredients

  • 2/3 cup honey
  • 1 15 oz. can pineapple slices in juice, drained
  • 1 can seeded black cherries in juice, drained
  • 1 1/3 cup butter, softened
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
  • 1/4 cup plain yellow corn meal
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 3/4 cup buttermilk
  • 3 large eggs
  • 1/4 cup honey
  • 1 tablespoon light brown sugar
  • 1 tablespoon butter

Directions

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Pour honey into a buttered 10 inch cast iron skillet or a pineapple upside down cake pan. Tilt to spread evenly. Top with pineapple and cherries.
  2. Beat sugar and butter at medium speed with stand mixer until fluffy. Stir in vanilla. In one bowl, whisk together flour, corn meal, baking powder, salt and baking soda. In another bowl whisk together buttermilk and eggs. Add flour mixture to sugar mixture alternately with buttermilk mixture, beginning and ending with flour mixture. Beat just until blended. Spread batter over pineapple.
  3. Bake for 50 minutes or until a toothpick in center comes out clean. Shield with foil after 45 minutes if necessary to prevent over browning. Cool on wire rack for 10 minutes.
  4. Invert cake onto serving platter. Drizzle with honey glaze and let cool 15 minutes before serving.

Honey Glaze

  1. Bring 1/4 cup honey, 1 tablespoon light brown sugar and 1 tablespoon butter to a simmer. Stir lightly. Cook 1 minute, then remove from heat.