Strawberry Lemonade Cupcakes

Credit goes to loveandoliveoil.com for this recipe, though I did make a few modifications (I used a different recipe for the strawberry frosting, and used whole milk instead of coconut milk in the cake). They were REALLY good. Despite the poor photo, these things were pretty in person and disappeared in seconds! Here’s the recipe:

Strawberry Lemonade Cupcakes
Print Recipe

1-1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
1/3 cup oil
1 cup full-fat coconut milk (I used whole milk instead)
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
1 teaspoon lemon juice

1. Preheat the oven to 350F
2. Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Add sugar and brown sugar, mix.
3. Whisk together oil, milk, lemon zest, lemon juice, and vanilla.
4. Mix wet and dry ingredients together until smooth.
5. Fill cupcake liners 2/3 full and bake for 20-25 minutes (or until a tester comes out clean). Cool on a wire rack.

Makes 12 cupcakes.

Strawberry Buttercream Frosting
1 cup softened butter
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 lb powdered sugar
1 cup fresh strawberries (puree in a food processor)

Cream the butter and vanilla until smooth. Add the sugar gradually. Add strawberries – just enough to tint and flavor the frosting.

*Adding the strawberries will add a significant amount of moisture to the buttercream frosting. If you want frosting that is more dry, try to remove excess water from the strawberries before pureeing them. Otherwise, just be careful about adding the strawberries slowly — so you can control how runny the frosting gets. The frosting I used was a little runny, but it worked fine, tasted GREAT, and firms up nicely if you refrigerate the cupcakes after frosting them (remember to store them in an air-tight container so they don’t dry out!)