Strawberries are one of my favourite fruits and I love it when they are in season. There are just so many things you can do with strawberries and they make good “accessories” for food styling too.

I’ve never been a fan of frosting; partly because I find it too sweet and also messy when it comes to using the piping bag. However, my latest obsession is whipping cream. It’s light and easy to work with and the best thing is that it doesn’t make the cake feel as heavy and sinful compared to buttercream.

Since strawberries are on sale at the supermarkets this week, I’ve decided to make fresh strawberries cupcake. Instead of making a plain vanilla cupcake with fresh strawberries, I added lemon zest for an extra flavour. Everyone loved the cupcakes and they looked so pretty with the whipped cream frosting. Hope that you’ll enjoy it as much as we did!

Nutrition per cupcake

Ingredients for the cupcake

1. 200g self-raising flour
2. 120g unsalted butter (room temperature)
3. 100g caster sugar
4. 2 eggs
5. 150ml buttermilk
6. 1 tsp vanilla essence
7. Zest 2 lemons
8. 5 fresh strawberries chopped up into pieces

Ingredients for the frosting

1. 300ml whipping cream
2. 50g caster sugar
3. 5 strawberries (pureed)
4. 1 tsp vanilla essence

Directions

Preparation time: 10-15min
Baking time: 15-20min or when the skewer comes out clean 

To make the cupcake

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees
2. Prepare a 12 case muffin tin with cupcake liners
3. Using a whisk, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy
4. Then add in the eggs one at the time and continue to cream
5. Add in the vanilla essence and lemon zest
6. Turn down the speed of the whisk to low. Alternate between the flour and buttermilk until a uniform mixture is formed
7. Add in the freshly chopped strawberries into the batter
8. Divide the batter equally into the muffin tin
9. Place it into the oven to bake for 15-20min or when the skewer comes out clean
10. Leave the cupcakes to cool

To make the frosting

1. Place the whipping cream, caster sugar, strawberries puree and vanilla essence into a mixing bowl
2. Using a hand whisk, whisk the mixture in high speed until stiff peaks are formed
3. Prepare a piping bag and place the frosting into the piping bag
4. Carefully pipe the frosting over the cooled down cupcakes
5. Add fresh strawberries onto the frosting for decoration and place it in the fridge to be chilled