Citrus cupcakes and picnics

Friends and I had a post Australia-day picnic and I wanted something nice and zesty to perk people after their Australia day celebrations. The day was hot and windy, and our location at Sydney Park was perfect. I instagrammed it, obviously. 

What I love about these cupcakes is that they’re so simple, but awesome – they’re beautifully moist and citrus-laden. I can’t think of more ways to explain how glorious these cupcakes are, I just love them… you should bake them!

The little cakes are moist and sweet, while the icing is mouth-puckeringly tart – the combination of the two is just gorgeous. The icing stops the cakes from being overly saccharine, while the cake softens the edges of the citrus tang; these two are a match made in citrus heaven.

Citrus cupcakes:

Makes 20

• 125g butter
• 1 cup sugar
• 4 eggs
• 250g (2 ¼ cups) almond meal
• 1 cup self-raising flour
• 1 orange, zest and juice

Icing:

• 2 cups icing sugar
• 1 small lemon, zest and juice

Preheat your oven to 180°C

Cream butter and sugar together until pale and smooth. Add the eggs and almond meal and mix until incorporated. Sift the flour into the bowl and mix that too.

Pop the zest and juice of the orange into the mixture and give it one final mix before scooping generous spoonfuls of batter into cardboard cupcake cases. Aim to fill them about ¾ of the way up, as this mixture doesn’t rise very much.

Bake for 20-23 minutes until the edges start to turn golden brown and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean*. Transfer cakes onto a cooling rack.

While the cakes cool, zest and juice the lemon. Combine the lemon juice, icing sugar and about half of the zest to make the icing. Reserve the other half of the zest to decorate the cupcakes with.

To ice, drop a tablespoon of mixture onto the crest of each of your cupcakes and allow It to run down the sides naturally. The icing is pretty thin, so should sort itself out – if this approach is too messy for your liking, simply use the back of the spoon to spread the icing out. Top some of the iced cupcakes with  your remaining lemon zest.

*This batter can also be made into a cake – simply pop the mixture into a greased cake tin and cook for 40-50 minutes.