I don’t know if you have noticed, but lately I have been making lots recipes that include lemons and olive oil. My Meyers lemon tree is full of lemons and I’m trying to use them as much as I can. This particular recipe I adapted from Lucero’s Lemon Olive Oil Cupcakes with White Balsamic Icing. Lucero is a well-known olive oil producer and I have been checking out the recipes on their website. I loved the idea that the lemon cupcakes are flavored only with lemon infused olive oil. It worked and they were delicious. I didn’t follow the White Balsamic Icing basically because I didn’t have white lemon balsamic vinegar. Do you? I didn’t want to buy a bottle of something that I didn’t think I would use on anything else. So, I made a simple lemon icing and it actually turned out pretty well. I used some lemon extract that I had made previously. If you are adventurous then by all means look up the recipe at lucerooliveoil.com and try it out.
I try to bring something every week to my fellow volunteers at the food locker. You know how you get so much joy from giving. Giving is better than receiving. My co-volunteers really show appreciation and joy from tasting all my stuff. I must confess that I get a big thrill when I receive good feedback from someone who is eating whatever I have made. Hearing someone say that it’s really good or yummm… or can I have the recipe?, gives me so much satisfaction. And after I get all the praises and make sure that the recipe is good, I get to do it all over again with you when I share it here. Blogging is almost as wonderful as cooking for someone in person. Thanks for reading and being a part of my joy. Here’s the Lemon Olive Oil Cupcake recipe:
Ingredients
Cupcakes
3 Eggs
2 1/2 cups Sugar
1 1/2 cups Lemon Infused Olive Oil
1 1/2 cups Milk
2 1/2 cups Flour
1/2 tsp. Baking Powder
1/2 tsp. Baking Soda
3/4 tsp. Salt
Icing
1 tsp. Lemon Extract (Mine is homemade. You can always use vanilla extract.)
3 Tbl. Lemon Juice
2 cups Powdered Sugar
Place paper liners in muffin pans. This makes about 30 cupcakes. Mix the Eggs, Lemon Infused Olive Oil, and Milk. Sift the dry ingredients, the Flour, Baking Powder, Baking Soda and Salt, in a separate bowl.
Add the wet ingredients to the dry ones.
This makes a lot of batter. Fill cupcake liners 3/4 full. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean from the center.
Let cool and glaze with the icing.
For the icing, just mix the Lemon Juice, Lemon Extract and Powdered Sugar until smooth.
The CD I’ve been listening to a lot lately when I’m cooking is Seis Cuerdas. It’s beautiful guitar music. I love it!
I made 24 regular cupcakes and 10 mini-cupcakes.
Each cupcakes contains: 309 Calories, 12.2 grams Fat, 49.9 grams Carbs, 2.1 grams Protein.
Yikes!! but they are really yummy for an occasional treat.
Maria — You can tell I don’t know much but do I need to buy lemon infused olive oil or can I make it myself? I have some Meyer lemons a friend gave me and they are SO delicious!!
Hi Sherida,
You can make your own Lemon Infused Olive Oil but you have to be careful. If any traces of water get in the olive oil, it can create Botulism! With 3 cups of good olive oil and 6 lemons, you can make some. Just wash the lemons really well. Peel them. Let them dry well, maybe overnight but at least 1 hour. Then set them in a bottle or glass container, add the oil. After 2 weeks, discard the lemons and you have Lemon Infused Olive Oil.
To reduce the risk of Botulism, you can heat the oil and the lemon peels in a pot on medium-low heat. Cook until it reaches 180 degrees. Let it cool and strain out the fruit. This can affect the olive oil because of the heat but less chance of Botulism.
I don’t know, Sherida, I think it’s so much easier to go buy a bottle. But if you have a lot of lemons, you could make lemon extract. I used mine in this recipe. It’s very easy, just grate with a microplane 2 lemons. Put in a jar with 2/3 cups of vodka. Cover, shake and let sit in a dark place for 10 days. That’s it.
Thanks for writing. Good luck and happy baking!
Maria
Hi Maria!
I just wanted to thank you for this wonderful recipe! I’ve been trying various olive oil cupcake recipes online and this is my favourite by far! It came out so delicious and moist–apparently a little too moist, according to my mom, but I liked it! I didn’t have any lemon infused olive oil on hand so I just used regular Extra Virgin Olive Oil and added 7 Tbs of lemon juice and it turned out good! I would maybe even add more lemon juice or zest next time, but maybe that’s part of the reason why it came out so moist? Anyways, thank you, again, so much for sharing this recipe! All the best to you!
I’m so glad that you liked the Lemon Olive Oil cupcake recipe. I think you might be right in thinking that the lemon juice may have made your cupcakes a little too moist. If you don’t have lemon infused olive oil handy, you can make some. It takes some planning but if you put some lemon peels in the olive oil and refrigerate for 2 days or so, the olive oil will pick up the lemon taste and that might save you from adding the lemon juice. Thank you so much for writing and telling me about your experience.
Happy Baking,
Maria