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Summer never quite arrived this year in San Diego. But nevertheless, here are some starfish and sharks to bid it farewell.
Starfish cupcakes: Swiss meringue buttercream frosted vanilla cupcakes, dipped in graham cracker crumbs and topped with a marzipan starfish
Shark cupcakes: Swiss meringue buttercream frosted vanilla cupcakes, with metallic cardstock
In the 16 months I have lived here, I have only been to the beach once. What a shame. I must fix this immediately!
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As far as fruit cupcakes go, this is hands-down my favorite: white cupcakes with freshly diced strawberry bits, topped with Swiss meringue buttercream flavored with strawberry puree. With strawberries doing most of the sweetening, this cupcake tastes particularly light, natural and fresh (and perhaps just a tiny bit healthier *wishful thinking*).
Okay, so it wasn’t exactly a surprise, given that I asked my hubby to go buy strawberries for his own birthday cupcakes (although it was a surprise in that I didn’t tell him until the last minute to do so . . .). In my defense, I was pulling an all-nighter to try to finish as much unexpectedly-assigned work as possible, so that I wouldn’t ruin his birthday.
I knew he loved strawberries, as that tends to be his go-to flavor in the dessert department, so we went for a midnight jog to Vons to buy up the last couple of boxes of strawberry left. After he went to sleep, I decided to pipe some chocolate toppings to try to add back some element of surprise.
He loved the cupcakes and I hear his co-workers did as well. I didn’t get much sleep, but it was worth it!
Post-wedding, our kitchen is now happily equipped with a stand mixer and a kitchen torch. That means, not only do I no longer need to hand-beat meringue for 15+ minutes (a vigorous exercise, to say the least), I can brûlée things to my heart’s content. Everyone likes to play with fire!
This cupcake bursts with flavor with lemon zest and pulp baked into the fluffy cake and lemon curd on top &mdash or optionally, lemon custard filling the center, as shown in the photo above &mdash contrasted with an airy, whipped meringue frosting.
For this cupcake flavor, I highly recommend a lighter cake to match the topping. While Martha Stewart suggests a lemon buttermilk cake, I find that a recipe closer to cakelove’s Light and Lemony Cake is less dense and thus more harmonious with the meringue. I think a sponge cake would be delicious as well. Thanks to my friend Ji at cakes by Ji for introducing me to the wonderful world of cakelove!