Recipe: Rosemary Lemonade Cupcakes
Because we love you all from the bottom of our beer bottles, we’re sharing a recipe this time! We’re also posting the recipe because the last time we used a Dogfish Head beer and didn’t post a recipe, there was hell to pay. We’ve learned our lesson. Now, I introduce to you, Rosemary Lemonade Cupcakes using Dogfish Head’s Saison du Buff, which is a collaboration beer between Dogfish Head, Stone, and Victory. This collaboration happened first in 2010, and now, again, in 2012. If you haven’t got your hands on this beer yet, I highly recommend that you do. This beer is delicious, and is a perfect match for these rosemary infused lemon cupcakes.
On to the recipe!
Rosemary Lemonade Cupcakes
(Makes about 18 cupcakes)
Ingredients:
1 cup water
1/4 cup rosemary leaves
1/2 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice (about 2 lemons)
2 1/2 cups flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoons baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 stick butter (8 tablespoons)
Lemon zest of 1 lemon
1 1/4 cups sugar
2 eggs
1/2 cup beer
1/2 cup rosemary lemon juice (from above)
Directions:
1. In a small sauce pan, bring 1 cup water to a boil. Once boiling, add 1/4 cup rosemary leaves (we used dried rosemary). Boil for 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat and add 1/2 cup lemon juice. Let sit while you prepare the cupcake batter.
2. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Place paper cupcake liners in pans, set aside.
3. Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
4. In a large bowl, beat butter and lemon zest until creamy. Add in sugar, then beat again until combined. Add eggs 1 at a time, beating between each addition.
5. Beat in 1/4 of the dry ingredients, then add beer to the batter. Mix well.
6. Using a strainer to separate the rosemary leave from the juice, strain 1/2 cup of the rosemary lemon water into a measuring cup. (Save the remaining rosemary lemon juice to use in the frosting, see recipe below) Mix this alternating with the rest of the dry ingredients into the batter, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients.
7. Fill cupcake liners with a 1/4 cup of batter, place in preheated oven and bake for about 15 minutes. Use a toothpick inserted in the center to tell if it’s done after 15 minutes. It should come out clean.
After your cupcakes have cooled, you can prepare the frosting.
Rosemary Lemonade Cream Cheese Frosting
Ingredients:
1 stick butter (8 tablespoons), room temperature
1 8-ounce package cream cheese, room temperature
2 1/2+ cups powdered sugar
left over rosemary lemon juice from cake recipe above
Directions:
1. Beat butter and cream cheese together until smooth and creamy
2. Beat in powdered sugar, 1 cup at a time. Add in leftover rosemary lemon juice and beat well. If the frosting is too runny, just beat in more powdered sugar.
3. Frost cupcakes after they’ve cooled, and enjoy!
If you make these cupcakes, please tell us how they turned out for you in the comments, we’d love to hear about them! If you have an idea for a cupcake, or a beer to use, let us know! We’re always willing to try something new.
– Jackie & Dylan
Lemon Pomegranate IPA Cupcakes
Our blog will be 1 year old in 2 months. I can’t believe we’ve been baking a different type of cupcake almost every weekend for the last 10 months. That sounds like a lot of cupcakes! We’ve come up with 36 different flavors and posted them up here (there were a few duds that we haven’t posted). Someone asked me a couple weeks ago if we ever run out of cupcake ideas. While we haven’t yet, it got me thinking. I think we’ve gone through a lot of basic cupcake flavors, now it’s time to get into some new flavor combinations.
To start off our new flavor pairings, we bring you these Lemon Pomegranate IPA cupcakes. I sent Dylan off to the store to find a nice hoppy IPA to match with the lemon cake I wanted to bake. He came back with 4 different bottles (it was difficult to choose)! This round we decided to use Hopworks Urban Brewery’s IPA, a balanced blend of hops, bitter, and a bit of a citrus flavor. A perfect pairing for the zesty lemon flavor in this cake.
The cake itself has the zest of 2 lemons, plus a bit of extra lemon juice, along with a full cup of IPA. I reduced a bit of pomegranate juice and added it into a cream cheese frosting, stirred in some more lemon zest, and piped it on the cakes after they had cooled. As a garnish, I placed a small spoonful of pomegranates seeds on top. Not only did they look pretty, they added a lot of flavor to the whole package. As you take a bite of the soft lemon cake, you get a rush of pomegranate juice from the seeds, it’s quite delicious.
We’re hoping to add a few more flavors to our official flavor list soon. It’s been a little crazy in our house lately, planning a wedding and all. If you have any suggestions on what you’d actually like to be able to purchase (here in Spokane, sorry, no shippy yet), we’d love to here from you. Let us know!
– Jackie & Dylan
Sweet and Stout 