Summery cupcakes (blueberry muffins with cream cheese icing)

I made these for a friend’s birthday as a celebration of summer. With the biscuit ‘sand’ and the mini umbrellas, these recall long summer days spent at the beach. The blueberry cupcakes and lemon cream cheese icing pair beautifully together to make a delicious summer treat.

Ingredients:

Cupcakes

• 75g unsalted butter
• 200g plain flour
• 1/2tsp bi-carb soda
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 75g caster sugar
• pinch of salt
• 200ml buttermilk (or 100g yoghurt and 100ml semi-skimmed milk)
• 1 large egg
• 200g blueberries (about two punnets found in any supermarket)

Icing

• 125g cream cheese
• 30g butter
• 2 cups icing sugar
• Zest of 1 lemon
• 5 scotch finger biscuits, crushed for topping

Melt the butter and set aside to cool. Line a 12-cup muffin pan with papers and pre-heat the oven to 200°c.

In one bowl, mix together the flour, bi-carb soda, baking powder and salt.

Mix together the melted butter, buttermilk, eggs and vanilla in a separate bowl.

Make a well  in the dry ingredients and pour in the wet ingredients. Fold in gently and mix briefly. Add in the blueberries and stir to combine. Don’t overwork the mixture, it doesn’t matter if it’s a little lumpy.

Divide the mixture between the patty pans and bake for around 20 minutes. Remove from the pans and transfer to a wire rack to cool.

While they cool, make the cream cheese icing by beating together the  cream cheese and butter (at room temperature) until light and fluffy. Add in the lemon zest and beat to combine. Add in the icing sugar and beat until the icing thickens.

Ice each cooled cupcake and then roll in crushed biscuit. Top with a paper parasol. Serve immediately or cover and store in the fridge (sans parasol).