LEMON RASPBERRY CHOCOLATE CUPCAKES

Valentine’s cupcakes for your sweetheart, child, family, co-worker – am I missing anyone? Oh and your pets, although this Raspberry & Lemon Chocolate Cupcake won’t be appropriate for canines with the chocolate base and all, or maybe for any pet.

Lemon Raspberry Chocolate Cupcakes

I just know that by way of tradition, I’m suppose to do something for the people in my life on this special day. Today and up until Valentine’s Day it will be you guys, lucky for me, because I don’t have dessert lovers in my everyday life. I know it’s something that my dessert-fixing hands can’t comprehend, especially since I love making highly stacked cupcakes like this.

My little guy looked at them and said, “I don’t like frosting, I don’t even like cupcakes”. I stopped crying over such statements long ago. Now it’s all about misdirection—I gave him one of the mini bites (no frosting) and told him it was donut. Not a total lie, er-misdirection, it did come out of a mini donut pan. So what, that it’s the same cupcake batter that he turns his nose up to.

You parents out there do that with savory foods like veggies all the time, right? Well I do that with desserts too. See, we aren’t so different.

A few notes:

• To shortcut this you can use store-bought lemon curd or use homemade.
• To finish the cupcake as seen in the picture I used a mini donut pan to make the chocolate ring you see on top of the frosting.
• I generally only fill my cupcakes a 1/3 of the way up, so that once they are baked the cupcake comes up just before the top of the lining. This allows me use the liner as a steady wall to hold up the piping. For this specific cupcake design, it’s especially helpful to hold the raspberries in place.
• If you are on the Vine app (only available on iPhone, my username: @bakersroyale), then you can find a quick clip where I show you how to frost these cupcakes.

• LEMON RASPBERRY CUPCAKES

  YIELD: 12 cupcakes

  Ingredients:

  CUPCAKE

  • 1 cup (4.5 ounces) all purpose flour
  • 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons (7.3 ounces) sugar
  • 1/3 cup plus 2 tablespoons (1.5 ounces) Scharffen Berger Unsweetened Natural Cocoa Powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 cup (1 stick or 4 ounces) unsalted butter, melted and warm
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
  • 1/2 cup hot water
  • 1 cup raspberry preserve (for filling cupcake once they are complete cooled)

  LEMON FROSTING

  • 5 large egg whites
  • 11/2 cup sugar
  • 4 sticks unsalted butter, diced and softened
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1 tablespoon vanilla
  • 1/2 cup lemon curd, store bought or homemade (click here for a homemade step-by-step version)

  Directions:

  1. Position a rack in the lower third of the oven. Heat the oven to 350 degrees.
  2. To make cupcake: Add flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking soda, and salt in a bowl and mix thoroughly to combine. Add in the butter, eggs, and vanilla and beat on medium speed for one minute. Add half of the water into the mixture and beat for 20 seconds. Scrape the sides of the bowl and add remaining water. Beat for 20-30 seconds until the batter is smooth. The batter will be thin enough to pour. Pour batter into 11 wells and transfer remaining batter into a cup with a pouring spout and fill a mini donut pan 2/3 of the way up in each well. Bake cupcakes for 18-22 minutes just until a toothpick inserted into a few of the cupcakes comes out clean. Bake mini cupcake donuts for 10 minutes. Set the pans on a rack to cool. Frost the cupcakes when they are completely cool.
  3. To make lemon frosting: Combine egg whites and sugar in a bowl placed over simmering water. Bring mixture to 160 degrees F while whisking constantly. Transfer mixture to stand mixer bowl, fitted with a whisk attachment and beat on medium high speed (speed 8 on a KitchenAid stand mixer)until mixture cools and doubles in volume and forms stiff peaks; about 10-12 minutes. Add butter in one piece at a time, mixing to incorporate after each addition. The mixture may appear clumpy and almost curdled looking-this is normal. Keep mixing and it will become even and smooth again. Add salt and vanilla and mix to combine. Add in lemon curd and mix to combine.
  4. Assembly: Core out center of cooled cupcake and fill with raspberry preserves. Pipe frosting to desired finish.

  
  

http://www.bakersroyale.com/lemon-raspberry-chocolate-cupcakes/

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