Lemon Buttermilk Cupcakes. Now includes regular and high-altitude recipes!
It’s getting warm here in Colorado. I’ll spend the early morning out in the garden, pulling the %#@& grass that loves to infiltrate my flower beds. While I was working this morning, I was thinking about what I wanted to make for an upcoming barbecue party. I settled on lemon . . . something. A nice lemon buttermilk cake seems cool and refreshing, and I had a feeling the party could wind up feeling a little toasty.
After searching, I settled on Lemon Buttermilk Cupcakes.
I came across the use of lemon with buttermilk a number of times, which seemed a bit strange at first. Both are fairly acidic, but the added fat of buttermilk balances with the sugar very well, creating a cake with a creamy texture, but leaving a genuine citrus tang on the tongue. To balance this even further, I coupled my cupcakes with a lemon cream-cheese frosting, but you could easily pair them with a lemon buttercream, too.
I found some decent recipes online (as you are doing right now.) But very rarely do I find one that doesn’t need to be adjusted for fat/sugar balance, moisture and leavening. A huge number of cake recipes out there are overleavened, and here in Colorado, that’s a huge problem. I run all my recipes through my balancing spreadsheet and make the adjustments to correct for improper ratios.
What are the correct ratios for a cake recipe? Here’s what I use (from Bakewise, by Shirley O. Corriher):
- Weight of Sugar = or > Weight of Flour (Ideal is 25% for white, 80% for chocolate)
- Weight of Eggs > Weight of Fat (Ideal is 10%)
- Weight of Liquid = or > Weight of Sugar
The very best baking book, Bakewise, by Shirley O. Corriher. Click on the photo to buy it now, new or used, from Alibris:
To get all the proportions right, I use an Excel spreadsheet to feed in the recipe info as it stands, and then I adjust based on my own experience and taste preferences. For example, in this recipe the liquid weight was too low for my high-altitude version, so I adjusted it using leftover lemon juice.
Lemon Buttermilk Cake and Cupcakes
Ingredients
Lemon Buttermilk Cupcakes
- 2 1/4 cups Cake Flour
- 2 1/4 tsp Baking Powder
- 1/2 tsp Salt
- 1 1/2 cups Buttermilk
- 5 lg Egg Whites
- 1 2/3 cups Sugar
- Zest from 2 lemons See notes on how to zest a lemon
- 8 tbsp Butter cut into chunks
- 1 tsp Natural Vanilla Extract
- 1/2 tsp Natural Lemon Extract
Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting
- 4 oz Butter Room temperature
- 8 oz Cream Cheese Room temperature
- 4 cups Powdered Sugar
- 1 tsp Natural Vanilla Extract
- Lemon juice From the zested lemons above
Instructions
- Set up 24 cupcake liners in cupcake tins, or grease and flour 2, 9″ cake rounds.
- Preheat oven to 350 F.
- In a large bowl (not the mixing bowl), whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the egg whites and buttermilk.
- In a large mixing bowl, add the sugar and lemon zest and whisk together until combined.
- Add the butter and beat until light – about 4 or even 5 minutes (this takes a while)
- Add the extracts and combine
- Starting with the flour mixture, add about 1/3 and mix until blended. Add about 1/2 the buttermilk/egg mixture and blend smooth. Add dry and wet ingredients in this way, alternating and ending with flour mixture.
- For Cupcakes: When the batter is well-blended, fill your cupcake liners about 2/3 with batter. (I use an ice-cream scoop).
- For Cake: When the batter is well-blended, fill your pans with cake batter. I use a scale to get the batter evenly divided.
- For Cupcakes: Bake in your preheated oven on the center rack for 18 to 22 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center of a center cupcake comes out clean. The cupcakes will not brown much, so don’t overbake!
- For Cake: Bake in your preheated oven on the center rack for 30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. The cake will not brown much, so don’t overbake!
- Remove from oven and cool in the pan for about 5 minutes, then remove to a wire rack to cool completely.
Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting
- Cream together the butter and cream cheese.
- Add the vanilla and beat until blended.
- Add about 1/2 the sugar and drape a light tea towel or cheesecloth over your mixer. Blend in the sugar on the lowest setting for a few seconds, remove the towel and blend until incorporated. Repeat.
- The frosting will be pretty stiff at this point. Add 1 tsp of lemon juice at a time and blend until you get the spreading consistency you prefer. I used 3 tsp of lemon juice.
Video
Notes
Here is the high-altitude (above 3,000 ft) version of my Lemon Buttermilk Cake and Cupcakes Recipe.
Lemon Buttermilk Cake and Cupcakes (High Altitude Version)
Ingredients
- 2 1/4 cups plus 2 tbsp Cake Flour (300 g)
- 1 1/4 tsp Baking Powder for 5280 ft. (1600 meters)
- 1/2 tsp Salt
- 1 1/2 cups Buttermilk
- 5 lg Egg Whites
- 1 2/3 cups less 1 1/2 tbsp Sugar (360 g)
- Zest from 2 lemons
- 2 tbsp Lemon Juice from zested lemons
- 8 tbsp Butter cut into chunks
- 1 tsp Natural Vanilla Extract
- 1/2 tsp Natural Lemon Extract
Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting
- 4 oz Unsalted Butter (1 stick, softened)
- 8 oz Cream Cheese (room temperature)
- 4 cups Powdered Sugar
- 1 tsp Natural Vanilla Extract
- Lemon Juice
Instructions
Lemon Buttermilk Cupcakes
- Measure out ingredients, remembering to ADD the additional cake flour and SUBTRACT the sugar. This and adjusting the baking powder are critical in making this recipe work at high-altitude.
- For Cupcakes: Set up 24 cupcakes liners in cupcake tins.For Cake: Grease and flour 2 9″ cake rounds.
- Preheat oven to 370F (190C).
- In a large bowl (or the mixing bowl), whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the egg whites and buttermilk until frothy.
- In a large mixing bowl, add the sugar and lemon zest and whisk together until combined.
- Add the butter and beat into the sugar until light and fluffy – and 4 or 5 minutes (this takes a while, take the time you need.)
- Add the extracts and lemon juice and combine.
- Starting with the flour mixture, add about 1/3 and mix until blended. Add about 1/2 the buttermilk/egg mixture and blend again. Add dry and wet ingredients in this way, alternating and ending with the flour.
- For Cupcakes: When the batter is well-blended, fill your cupcake liners about 2/3 with batter. (I use an ice-cream scoop).
- For Cake: When the batter is well-blended, divide the batter and fill the pans. I use a scale to get the amounts evenly divided.
- For Cupcakes: Bake in your preheated oven on the center rack for 16-18 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center of a center-oven cupcake comes out clean. The cupcakes will not brown much, so don’t overbake!
- For Cake: Bake in your preheated oven on the center rack for 25 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. The cake will not brown much, so don’t overbake!
- Remove from oven and cool in the pan for about five minutes, then remove to a wire rack to cool completely.
Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting
- Cream together the butter and cream cheese.
- Add the vanilla and beat until blended.
- Add about 1/2 the sugar and drape a light tea towel or cheesecloth over your mixer. Blend in the sugar on the lowest setting for a few seconds, remove the towel and blend until incorporated. Repeat.
- The frosting will be pretty stiff at this point. Add 1 tsp of lemon juice at a time and blend until you get the spreading consistency you prefer. 1 used 3 tsp of lemon juice.
Notes
For the very best lemon flavor, you need a quality lemon extract. I like this version from Savory Spice:
Leave me a note if you give it a try.
And if you liked these, take a look at another show-stopping cupcake: Coconut Cream Cupcakes. All-natural and packed with coconut flavor.
Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies Recipe
What is the secret to chewy chocolate chip cookies? Who doesn’t like Chewy Chocolate Chip…
Easy Banana Nut Bread Recipe
Easy Banana Nut Bread Recipe – This is my go-to banana bread recipe, as it…
Homemade Apple Crumb Pie
Apples are here, and Homemade Apple Crumb Pie is a great way to serve them…
Chocolate Oat Squares
Teaching kids the basics of baking is easy and fun with this time-tested simple recipe…
Mississippi Mud Bars
If you’ve never had one of these Mississippi Mud Bars, you’re in for a treat….
These are very pretty and look yummy. Did you sprinkle some type of sugar on the top? I didn’t see any mention of it in the recipe.
Good point – I didn’t mention that. I simply mixed some granulated sugar with about a teaspoon of grated lemon rind and squished it together with my fingers. I then sprinkled a little fingerful over the cupcakes.