the cupcake of my dreams.

So the diet is going fantastic!! Down 11lbs, and still counting!

On other news, remember the post about opening a cupcake shop? Well one of the cupcakes that I dreamed about making (it was in the middle of my diet and I was starving lol), was Lemon Meringue Cupcakes!
       

The pictures aren't too good, bad lighting, and I used a different camera. But I made lemon cupcakes, cut out the center and filled it with a lemon filling, then topped with meringue. IT WAS DELICIOUS!!!
However during the middle of baking, I totally forgot that my hand mixer had broken and I'd threw it out....have you ever made meringue without a hand mixer??? It was incredibly exhausting!
The 1st batch I failed, and didn't mix fast enough. I tossed it, and called boyfriend over, and we would switch off mixing and pouring sugar in. I have no idea how people made meringue before electric mixtures were made?!? So as it turns out, without the power of a electric mixture the meringue wasn't as stiff as it should be, so it was incredibly messy and I just poured it over the cupcakes. They were still, nonetheless, Amazing.

In two weeks I'm in charge of boyfriends reception, and we've decided to make some of the cupcakes for it. I will definitely post WAY better pictures with much better looking frosting!

**PS These cupcakes are WAY BOMB!! they were actually moist and light, unlike all my other cupcakes. Maybe I'm actually getting better at baking! Fingers crossed!

Lemon Cupcakes

by Samantha

Ingredients

1. 3 cups self-rising flour
2. 1/2 teaspoon salt
3. 1 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
4. 2 cups white sugar
5. 4 eggs, at room temperature
6. 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
7. 1 cup whole milk, divided
8. 2 1/2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice, divided (to taste, I added a lot more)
9. 1 teaspoon baking powder

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
2. Sift the self-rising flour and salt together in a bowl. In another bowl, beat the unsalted butter and sugar with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs one at a time, beating each egg until incorporated before adding the next. Mix in the vanilla extract and lemon zest.
3. Gently beat the flour mixture into the butter mixture, one third at a time, alternating with half the milk and half the lemon juice after each of the first 2 additions of flour. Beat until just combined; do not over mix.
4. Fill the prepared cupcake liners with batter 3/4 full, and bake in the preheated oven until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 17 minutes. Let the cupcakes cool in the pans for about 10 minutes before removing them to finish cooling on a rack.

I filled with lemon filling, and topped with meringue. Both can be found in the Lemon Meringue Pie recipe.