Lemon curd cupcakes

When I was a little girl the small family bakery down the road from my Grandma and Grandpa’s house was my home away from home. The smell of sweet and buttery cakes, the crunch of chocolate chip cookies and salty and peppery filling of fresh meat pies would consume my thoughts. However my secret desire every time I’d walk past to go to Foodland and buy milk, was those small soft, vanilla infused, melt-in-your-mouth cupcakes with hard icing that would crack as soon as you put it in your mouth.

So every time I see a cupcake now my mind drifts to those days walking hand in hand with my cousin, almost running to just get a whiff of that cupcake aroma.

I’ve written about the power of food to conjure memories and this is no exception. The simple smell of cupcakes in 2010, when the cupcake craze hit Sydney, would send me into a spin. Every morning I would walk through the train station, using every ounce of my will power to ignore the sweet, alluring aroma of freshly baked cupcakes.

So when my nephew turned one, cupcakes seemed like the obvious thing to cook. With excess of lemons from my workmates lemon tree, I couldn’t go past lemon curd cupcakes.

Cupcake recipe:

• 200g butter softened
• 1 teaspoon vanilla essence
• 1 cup caster sugar
• 1 egg and 2 egg whites
• 2 ½ cups self-raising flour
• ¼ cup milk
• ¼ cup Greek yoghurt.

Lemon curd:

• 2 eggs and 2 egg yolks
• ¾ cup caster sugar
• 90g butter
• Juice of 2 lemons.

Butter icing:

• 200g butter softened
• 1 ¼ cup icing sugar, sifted.

Method:

To make the cupcakes:

• Preheat oven to 180 degrees fan forced
• Using an electric beater cream the butter and sugar
• Add the eggs and mix well
• Mix the yoghurt and milk together
• A little at a time add the sifted flour and yoghurt and milk mixture to the batter
• Mix in vanilla essence
• Put 1 tablespoon of mixture into each cupcake pan
• Bake for 16 – 20 minutes or until cooked through.

To make the lemon curd:

• Whisk the sugar and egg together until creamy
• Add the butter and lemon and cook over a low heat, whisking until thick
• Let cool.

To make the butter vanilla icing:

• Soften the butter and add the sifted icing sugar
• Mix until creamy.

Putting it together:

• Once the cupcakes are cool, cut a small circle out of the middle and put a teaspoon of lemon curd into each hole
• Top each hole with the cut out circle
• Top with icing
• ENJOY!

Moist, creamy and tangy, these cupcakes are the perfect adult treat. A bonus is you’ll have some lemon curd left to devour any way you wish.

Fun farewell yoghurt fact: “There has long been a belief that eating yogurt is associated with longevity, and many studies have been done. In fact, Bulgarians have a longer than average lifespan and it is believed that this is due to the large quantities of cultured milk products that they consume.”

Source: http://www.dairygoodness.ca/yogurt/yogurt-facts-fallacies