Strawberry Lemon Cupcakes

Warm February days have me ready to put away my winter sweaters and pull out the shorts and sundresses.  Last week I was basking in 80 degree weather and this week, I'm contemplating putting the flannel sheets back on the bed just to keep warm at night.🤷🏻‍♀️  Welcome to February in Georgia.🌞❄️🙃  I'm certainly not the only one who caught a little Spring fever during our warm spell last week though.  I took a walk through this beautiful park in Savannah last week and there were lots of people soaking up the sun and laying in the grass trying to get a head start on their summer tan.👙 🌳🌷😎 

In case you're wondering, no - I did not get a new dog.😕  I borrowed this sweet pup from my son in law for the afternoon and I'm pretty sure that he thought he was being dog-napped when I loaded him into the car for our drive to the park. 😅🐶 

Within in 2 days of coming home from Savannah, the daffodils in my garden started to bloom so I took that as a sign for me to officially launch into full blown Spring mode.🌷😅 (I'm in denial about the fact that it was only 20 degrees last night. 😰)  For the next couple of weeks you can find me outside - tidying up my garden, pruning back the roses and getting ready to plant summer vegetables - even if I have to wear a wool scarf and gloves to do it.🧣🧤🤣 

Over the years, I've slowly transitioned to planting more fruits than vegetables in my garden.  Last year I gave up on the carrots, broccoli and beans and I grew tomatoes, pumpkins, raspberries, strawberries, blueberries and lemons.🍅🎃🫐🍓🍋  Clearly... I have a sweet tooth.😂   I love fresh fruit but unfortunately, so do the animals who live in my yard.  The birds eat more than their fair share of the blueberries and the squirrels love to eat my strawberries but I can hardly blame them though - there's nothing like the taste of home grown fruit.🫐 🍓🐦‍⬛🐿️ 

Strawberry season has been known to start as early as the first week of April in Georgia so I'm already preparing.  And by preparing, I mean, stocking up on my favorite dark chocolate bars so that I have plenty on hand when I'm ready to start dipping fresh berries.😅🍫🍓  I'm also dusting off some of my favorite strawberry recipes so I can have them handy when I get home from the berry farm with a bucket full of fresh strawberries.   

This is one of my new strawberry cupcake recipes and if you've ever wanted to know what Spring tastes like - just take a bite of one of these.🧁  Holding the refreshingly light lemon cupcake filled with bright and tangy lemon curd, topped with sweet strawberry cream cheese frosting and a fresh berry on top is like holding Spring in the palm of your hand.  OK, that was a little much but seriously - these are amazing and you should try them. 🍓🍋 

Strawberry Lemon Cupcakes
1 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
4 eggs, room temperature
4 teaspoons vanilla
1/2 cup fresh lemon juice
2 and 1/2 cups flour 
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup whole milk
2 Tablespoons lemon zest

Filling
​1/3 cup lemon curd

Cream Cheese Frosting
​2 Tablespoons strawberry jam
​1 Tablespoon lemon juice

Beat together butter and sugar. 

Beat in eggs and vanilla.

Slowly whisk in flour, baking powder and salt. 

Combine milk, lemon juice and zest.  Add to batter. 

Scoop batter into 12 paper lined cupcake tins.  

Bake 18 minutes at 350.

Scoop out core of cupcake and fill with spoonful of lemon curd. 

Prepare a batch of cream cheese frosting. 

Divide cream cheese frosting in half.  Add strawberry jam to one half and 1 T. lemon juice to the other half OR make it all strawberry.  

Pipe swirls of cream cheese frosting over cooled cupcakes. 

Ciao!

Click here for a printable version of this cupcake