Triple Lemon Baby Cakes with Lemon Pudding Cream

By vealam

Ingredients

• for the lemon baby cakes:
• 3-1/2 c. all-purpose flour
• 2-1/4 tsp. baking powder
• 3/4 tsp. kosher salt
• 1 c. unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 2-1/2 c. sugar
• 4 large eggs, at room temperature
• 5 T. freshly squeezed lemon juice
• 2 T. finely grated lemon peel
• lemon yellow food coloring, if desired, to enhance the yellow color
• 1-1/2 c. buttermilk
• for the lemon pudding cream:
• 3 c. heavy whipping cream
• 1 (3.4 oz.) package instant dry lemon pudding mix
• 1-1/4 c. powdered sugar
• fresh lemon zest from one large lemon
• 1 to 2 drops Americolor #107 "Lemon Yellow", if desired
• 50 about 50 lemon jelly beans (We used "Lemon Drop" flavor by Jelly Belly.)

Details

Servings 50
Adapted from afarmgirlsdabbles.com

Preparation

Step 1

for the lemon baby cakes:

Preheat oven to 350°.

A couple notes: I prefer to use flexible silicone mini muffin pans with no paper liners for this recipe, but you can also prepare metal mini muffin pans with paper liners. Also, I found that there are different sized mini muffin pans out there, so your yield and baking time may vary a bit. The silicone pans I used yield a little bigger mini cupcake than others, which I also happen to like.

Whisk flour, baking powder, and salt in medium bowl and set aside. In a large bowl, beat butter until smooth. Add sugar and beat to blend. Beat in eggs 1 at a time, then the lemon juice, lemon peel, and food coloring. Batter may look curdled, but that's just fine. Beat in the flour mixture alternately with the buttermilk, in 3 additions. Fill mini cupcake wells or liners a bit more than 3/4-full. Bake cupcakes until tester inserted into center comes out clean. This took about 20 minutes for me, but it will depend on the size of your pans, so pay close attention to your baking time. Cool 10 minutes and remove from pan. Cool completely before adding frosting.

for the lemon pudding cream:

Place whipping cream, pudding mix, and powdered sugar into a large chilled mixing bowl. Beat with a chilled whisk attachment until thick and stiff. Add lemon zest and food coloring, mixing to combine thoroughly.

to assemble the triple lemon baby cakes:

With a medium star tip, apply swirls of lemon pudding cream to the tops of each mini cupcake. Top each with a lemon jelly bean. Serve immediately or chill until ready to serve. These freeze well, but wait to add the jelly bean until right before serving.