Lemon Poppy Seed Cupcakes

Last night I found myself wondering what I could make to celebrate today being the last day of classes. I settled on inventing a cupcake recipe, but they needed to be gluten free for one of my pals. Fortunately, I just bought a whole whack of almond flour so I was halfway there. I got to experimenting and researching to figure out how many eggs, how much sugar etc. I wanted to use. I had also bought a whole bunch of cream cheese and butter while impulse shopping at the grocery store, so I had a good idea for what the icing could be, but first, I needed to brown the butter.

At the end of the evening I had almond flour lemon poppy seed cupcakes topped with brown butter cream cheese frosting. They were sublime... if I do say so myself. The test is always whether someone who doesn't need gluten free baked goods still enjoys them. I didn't have even one left when I got home, except for the one I'd stashed in a corner of the kitchen so I didn't accidentally share it with people.


Gluten Free Lemon Poppy Seed Cupcakes

Tannis Price took care of the photography:)

makes 24 mini-cupcakes or 12 smallish regular cupcakes

125 g butter (1/2 cup)
125 g sugar (1/2 cup)
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp almond extract
juice and zest of 1 lemon

300 g almond flour (3 cups)
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp-1/4 cup poppy seeds (depends how much you like them!)

1 Preheat the oven to 350 F, butter and sugar your tins
2 Beat the sugar and butter together until smooth
3 Beat the eggs, vanilla, almond extract and lemony goodness into the butter and sugar until smooth
4 Sift together the dry ingredients and mix thoroughly into the wet
5 Portion into the muffin tins and bake for 20 minutes, or until they are not wet in the middle anymore

Brown Butter Cream Cheese Frosting
makes 1 1/2 cups

65 g butter (1/4 cup)
50 g icing sugar (1/2 cup)
250 g cream cheese (1 cup)

1 Put the butter in a small pot over medium heat and cook until the milk solids brown slightly and the butter gives off a nutty flavour
2 Put the butter in the fridge to cool and take out the cream cheese, dice it and set aside in a bowl to come to room temperature while the butter cools
3 Once the butter is room temperature, beat it with the icing sugar then beat into the cream cheese (the cream cheese must be room temperature or prepare for lumps!)
4 Use to ice cupcakes with whatever you have on hand (I used a washed on milk bag and made messy spirals because it's all I have)

These aren't typical light and fluffy cupcakes, but they are not as dense as I feared they would be. They are tender, lightly almond flavoured and have a unique somewhat toothsome texture due to the poppy seeds and almond meal. As for  the icing... it makes a cup and a half, but I advise making double because it is addictive and you can easily snack on too much of it. Besides, it never hurts to have the cupcakes piled high to the sky with it since it's not overly sweet.