when life gives you lemons...

...why not make something lemony?

I have always been a big lemon lady - as a child I apparently used to sit in my high chair happily sucking on raw lemon segments, not a wince or grimace on my chubby cheeks. I do remember sneaking to the fridge when I was little and sneakily dipping the tip of my tongue in the lid of the concentrate lemon juice bottle for that little frisson of flavour. Naughty! I love my pancakes absolutely doused in limone juice with the merest sprinkle of sugar, a tarter than tart lemon meringue pie and French citron pressé made up of more citron than, erm, pressé....
A colleague of mine, who goes by the last name Lemon, had a birthday and I decided to bake some lemon cupcakes to honour the occasion.
To make, I creamed butter with sugar and grated lemon zest, then folded in 2 beaten eggs with flour and baking powder. Popped in the oven at 180C, for about 10 mins so they're not too solid, the mixture made around twelve cupcakes.

ready to rock

To add a bit of pizazz once the cupcakes came out of the oven, i cut the tops off, spooned in a dollop of lemon curd, then replaced the tops before icing with lemon butter (cream butter, icing sugar, lemon zest and lemon juice together into a spreadable consistency). I then sprinkled the cupcakes with a touch of silver edible glitter, along with those little lemon jelly slices (so retro) to stick on top of the cakes for added citrus impact. On the birthday boys cupcake I added his initials in chocolate along with a yellow candle, and finally just before serving I topped all the cakes with little flags with his face on them (complete with evil curly moustache doodled on...comedy value)

tops off

icing on

just lemon

I also wanted to make a jelly lemon lake but unfortunately ran out of time... To make fizzy jelly, you just dissolve jelly in 150ml hot water, and then add 420ml cold lemonade instead of cold water. Ramp it up for adults by adding champagne or sparkling wine into the mix instead of the lemonade... Pour the jelly mixtures into a suitable mould (rude ones if possible), for a refreshing fruity sweet with a fizz!

Lemony good.