It's strawberry season here on Long Island, yay!!!! I'm so happy. I visited my local farm stand and bought my first batch today :) :) :)
We ate some fresh and I used the rest to make a recipe for Strawberry Cupcakes from The Loveless Cafe Cookbook. They came out so good, full of fresh strawberry flavor in the cake and the buttercream, yummy!
Cake
2 cups fresh and ripe strawberries, washed, stemmed and hulled
2 1/3 cups cake flour
1 3/4 cups sugar
3 1/2 tsps baking powder
1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, at room temperature
4 egg whites
1/3 cup sour cream
1 tsp vanilla
Buttercream
3 sticks unsalted butter at room temp
4 1/2 cups confectioners sugar, sifted
1/4 cup fresh strawberry puree reserved earlier
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place mini paper cupcake liners into mini muffin pans, makes about 72 mini muffins or 20 standard cupcakes. Puree the strawberries in a food processor. Measure 3/4 cup for the batter and reserve 1/4 cup for the buttercream. Caution - stick to these amounts for good consistency in batter and buttercream - I used a little more in the buttercream and it came a little too loose.
Sift the cake flour into the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Add the sugar and baking powder and blend on low just until combined. Add the butter and puree and mix on low until combined. In a separate bowl whisk together the egg whites, sourcream and vanilla. Add this mixture to the flour mixture and mix on low, scraping bowl as needed. Mix on medium a few more seconds until well combined. Using a 1 tablespoon scoop, scoop batter into mini cupcake liners.
Bake for about 10-12 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. Bake about 20 mins for standard cupcakes. Remove from pan and allow them to cool.
For buttercream: Cream butter in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Add the confectioners sugar about a cup at a time and beat until blended. Add the puree and vanilla, scrape bowl as needed and beat until the buttercream is light and fluffy.
Place buttercream in a pastry bag fitted with a start tip and decorate tops of cupcakes. If desired garnish each cupcake with a piece of fresh strawberry.
Adapted from: "Desserts from the famous Lovelss Cafe" book available here:
http://astore.amazon.com/rosscoubak-20/detail/1579654347
And here is one more great strawberry cupcake recipe, decisions, decisions - this one is very similar, but instead of pureeing the strawberry you use strawberry pieces - chopped small, a great Martha Stewart recipe found here: http://www.marthastewart.com/338183/strawberry-cupcakes-with-strawberry-butt
Enjoy!
These look fresh and scrumptious :D
ReplyDeleteCheers
Choc Chip Uru
thank you!!
DeleteI love the way you incorporated the strawberries into the batter. Yum!
ReplyDeleteYum, yum! Rosie, these cupcakes look divine. I love that you used fresh strawberries in them.
ReplyDeleteThanks Anita and Jennie!
ReplyDelete