Lemon Cupcakes with Lemon-Coconut Cream Frosting

Howdy All! Here is another exciting episode of my kitchen blunders and wonders! Was still in my lemon mood today. Saw a very inspiring recipe for Lemon cupcakes with lemon butter cream frosting on the 1/4 cup Kitchen blog, so I thought Why not!

Obviously I didn't follow the recipe exactly, just used it as an inspiration. Like my mom use to say, I never listen to anyone anyways. When cooking or baking I usually don't like to use boxed and canned items and try my best to make everything from scratch, but today I made an exception. I had picked up a box of Betty Crocker's Lemon cake and used that as a base. I made 9 cup cakes and two 6" cakes.

I have an e-version of the book "What's New, Cupcake?". In the book there is a tip that if you want to make perfect cupcakes they must be a bit firm . Therefore when ever you buy a box cake mix , use 4 eggs rather than the 3 eggs written on the box. Also substitute the water written on the box ( its usually 1and 1/4 cup water) and use one cup buttermilk in its place. The water will be more in quantity but use only one cup buttermilk in its place.

If you don't have buttermilk then no worries. Just take one cup milk and add one tablespoon of lemon juice (or vinegar) and let it stand for 10 minutes and then its good to use. Simple!

BUT....I just followed the box recipe and added a tablespoon of fresh lemon zest for an extra zing!When the cupcakes were done and cooled ,I carved out a hole in the top of the cupcakes and then filled them with my homemade strawberry sauce.

For strawberry sauce take 2-3 cups fresh strawberries and cut or slice as u like..I like it chunky. Wash, dry and slice and put in a microwaveable bowl and sprinkle 1/4 cup sugar and 2 tablespoons lemon juice and microwave it for 3-4 minutes till it boils and then cool it. It will thicken a bit. Now fill the cupcakes with the sauce. You can use blueberry or raspberry too if you want.


Now for the frosting. Buttercream frosting is obviously the best choice but its too sweet and I don't like too much sugar in my frosting. I'm no chef but I love to experiment. So I try to use some thing to substitute the sugar. Here is what I came up with. Its not your usual frosting but was so yummmm.

Lemon- Coconut Cream Frosting:
2 cups Confectioners Sugar (I used Icing Sugar)
1 cup coconut cream powder
1/2 cup dry milk powder (I used Nido)
1/2 cup soft butter (227 grams- one stick)
1 Tbsp fresh lemon zest
4Tblsp fresh lemon juice (use less if you don't like it tart)
1/4 cup milk (if you like your frosting really tart and lemony then you can use more lemon juice in place of this milk. That's what I did ;-)

In a bowl mix the softened butter with the lemon zest and 2tbsp milk and 2table spoon lemon juice and mix well. Then add the coconut powder and sugar slowly and and keep mixing. Slowly add the lemon juice till the frosting obtains required consistency. Chill a while and then frost the cupcakes. I used the remaining frosting on the cakes and the chilled them. They were really Yummm. I had 3 pieces already!