I am dry. Just. What a wet weekend we had here in Brisbane. Will and I hardly left the house all weekend and managed to get through 20 episodes of Prison Break season one. Lets just say I was plotting escapes in my dreams last night. I think I'd be pretty good at escaping should I find myself captive.
The only breaks we took were for eating and I managed a batch of hot dog rolls and choc-chip cookies between episodes just to ward off cabin fever (because baking cures everything remember).
What I really should have done is used the time to sort out the kitchen and more specifically, my baking supplies because they are well overdue for a stocktake. One thing in serious over-supply is cupcake liners but really, is there such a thing as too many?
You might also like white chocolate and raspberry blondies.
I think I could pretty much cater to any occasion you could imagine with my collection but for some reason, I quite often end up using the plain white ones. I think it's because I'm saving the fancy ones for 'a special occasion.' I hadn't actually defined 'special' so I have decided it now means 'any time cupcakes are in order' which pretty much means that I can use them whenever I like.
Another thing that I always have in good supply is frozen raspberries because they're the key ingredient in my morning smoothies but they also go beautifully in baked goodies like cupcakes.
Raspberry cupcakes, encased in their pretty cupcake embellished cupcake liners, are ooey and gooey and pretty in pink. The centre is moist and the icing coats your gums as you take a bite.
I made my icing with yoghurt instead of cream cheese like the original recipe (because I thought I had cream cheese but I thought wrong) which added a nice extra bit of tartness to the icing making it not too sweet. Because the icing was so runny, these were still just as good two days later as they were on the day of baking. If you prefer a thick icing, don't add quite as much yoghurt to the icing sugar.
Girly with their bright pink icing, they'd make the perfect addition to a fancy high tea spread or just an afternoon tea with the girls. Enjoy!
What about you? What do you do when the weather outside is frightful?
Recipe
Ingredients
Cakes
- 3 free-range eggs
- 225 g caster sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste
- 100 g unsalted butter melted
- 100 ml milk
- 210 g plain flour
- 2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 pinch of salt
- zest and juice of 1 lemon
- 150 g fresh or frozen raspberries
Icing
- 180 g icing sugar
- 150 g cream cheese or 80g plain Greek yoghurt
- 75 g fresh or frozen raspberries plus extra for decorating
Instructions
Cakes
- Preheat the oven to 170C fan-forced and line 2 12-hole cupcake trays with liners (will make between 18 and 23).
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the eggs, sugar and vanilla until pale and voluminous.
- Add the melted butter and the milk and beat them through.
- Sift the flour, baking powder and salt over the top and mix them into the batter.
- Mix in the lemon juice and zest and then finally the raspberries.
- Divide the batter between the cupcake cases (about 1 ½ tablespoon in each case).
- Bake the cupcakes for 15 minutes or until a cake tester inserted in the middle of one comes out clean.
- Transfer them to a wire rack to cool.
Icing
- Beat the icing sugar and cream cheese or yoghurt together in the bowl of an electric mixer until smooth and thick.
- Slowly add the raspberries and blend them in.
- At this stage you might need to add a little extra icing sugar to thicken the icing or a bit of milk or yoghurt to thin it.
- Spread the cooled cupcakes with icing and top each one with a raspberry.
The Life of Clare says
These cupcakes look so cute and what beautiful little wrappers you have! It was such a wet weekend in Brisbane. It was a bit of a shock to my dry Victorian system!
Claire says
Oh no Clare we do have nice weather sometimes. You'll just have to come back won't you?
Hotly Spiced says
I heard you had a horrendous weekend of rain. We've had so much of it too but not as much as Brissy. At least it stopped on Sunday but it was still a very overcast grey day. Good you made the most of being shut inside and making some lovely looking cupcakes. These are gorgeous. I always try to have a supply of frozen berries for my morning smoothies too xx
Claire says
We did Charlie it just didn't stop and it's back today. It's almost too miserable for smoothies!
Lorraine @ Not Quite Nigella says
Loving that dripping icing! And we fled to the sunny shores of Mildura. It was cold and rainy when we left Sydney! :(
Claire says
It's odd weather at the moment isn't it? Glad you could escape!
Jess says
I love the instant gratification - I missed the Downton Abbey bandwagon until two seasons in, but watching those first two seasons back-to-back was amazing! Why DO we save the good cupcake liners for some magical special occasion? I do the exact same thing, and I have cupcake liners for every holiday piled in my cabinet. Maybe I need to make myself a "special" batch of raspberry cupcakes!
Claire says
A special batch of raspberry cupcakes sounds perfect to me Jess!
The Café Sucré Farine says
Claire, you are way to young to be saving cupcake papers for "special occasions". These papers are lovely and I'm glad you used them ........... your photos are making me smile, they're so cheerful! My grandmother used to save her best underwear and never wear them so that she'd have something "special" to wear in case she were ever hospitalized. That made me want to treat every day as a special occasion! :)
Oh, and I wouldn't care if it rained all week and weekend if I could eat these fabulous looking cakes!
Claire says
Haha must be an old soul Chris! Glad I could make you smile too :-)
I think every day should be a special occasion too. I don't save my special tea cups for special occasions.