May Bake It! Recipe – Lemon Meringue Cupcakes

Sorry, I’m a little (or a lot!) late this month posting the recipe! I hope the lemon meringue cupcake recipe – delicious for these sunny Spring days, will make up for it. There were only a couple of entries into the club again last month so congratulations to Lucy, who I picked randomly as the ‘winner’ of a signed copy of my book. Please email me your address Lucy.

This lemony cupcake recipe with soft meringue icing is absolutely delicious and it has gone down so well with family and friends that I have made several batches in the past few weeks! If you are a super domestic goddess then you can use the egg yolks left over from the meringue to make the lemon curd. If you are lazy like me then you can use lemon curd from a jar and chuck your extra yolks into your scrambled egg!

Ingredients (makes 12 cupcakes)

150g butter/baking margarine (I always use Stork for cupcakes)

1 tbsp lemon curd

150g caster sugar

150g self raising flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

2 eggs

For the topping

12 tsp lemon curd

2 egg whites

100g caster sugar

1. Preheat the oven to 160°C and place 12 muffin/cupcake cases in a muffin tin.

2. Cream together the butter/margarine, lemon curd and sugar until light and creamy either by hand using a knife or wooden spoon, or using a food mixer.

3. Sift together the flour and baking powder. Add 1 egg and half the flour to the butter and sugar mixture and beat to combine. Repeat with the other egg and the rest of the flour and mix until the ingredients are well combined.

4. Divide the mixture equally between the cupcake cases – a spring loaded scoop is a useful tool but a couple of teaspoons will do the job just fine.

5. Bake for approx 15 minutes until the cakes are risen and golden. If they still don’t looked cooked then bake for a few minutes longer. Remove from the oven, allow to cool in the tin for a couple of minutes then remove to a wire rack to cool completely.

6. Spread a teaspoon of lemon curd over the top of each cupcake.

7. To make the meringue, whisk the egg whites with an electric whisk until they have formed stiff peaks – you can hold the bowl upside down over your head to test if you’re feeling brave! Don’t over-whisk as the mixture can begin to go back to being a liquid.

8. Gradually add the sugar, a tablespoonful at a time, whilst continuing to whisk, until it has all been added. It should become glossy and should be able to hold its shape.

9. You can either spoon the meringue onto the top of each cupcake or pipe it on using a large star tip nozzle to make a pretty swirl.

10. Preheat the grill and place your cupcakes onto a baking tray/grill pan (make sure it is something that is suitable to go under a grill!) Place the cupcakes under the grill and keep a close eye on them. Once the meringue is nicely browned all over, remove them and leave them to cool.

These little beauties are best eaten with a fork and really need to be eaten the same day they are made – what an excellent excuse!

As always, please grab yourself a blog badge from the sidebar if you’d like, and add your photos to the Flickr group to show off your brilliant baking. I will add a link list on Friday 27th May, which I’ll leave open until Friday 3rd June for you to add your blog posts to.

Happy Baking!