Lemon cupcakes filled with lemon curd and Italian meringue frosting

I'm having my parents over for a little time and of course I'm doing desserts almost everyday for them to enjoy!

We were not very lucky with the weather this week unfortunately so I wanted to bring the sun inside my house, and that for me is the taste of lemon, its color, the freshness of it, its smell...

For 24 small Lemon Cupcakes
1 1/2 cups of flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup of plain yogurt
1 cup of sugar
3 eggs
2 tsp lemon zest
1/2 tsp vanilla essence
1/2 cup of sunflower oil

Put on a bowl the flour, salt and baking powder. Set aside.
In a mixing bowl, whisk the yogurt, sugar, eggs, lemon zest and vanilla essence. Add the dry ingredients by batches.
Fill in the cupcakes and bake till it's done at 180° C. Depending on your oven, this might take 15 to 30 minutes approx.

Lemon Curd
75 g of melted unsalted butter
juice of 4 lemons
120 g sugar
3 eggs
1 spoon corn flour
the zest of 2 lemons
125 gr of unsalted butter

Mix eggs, sugar and corn flour. Add this to the melted butter mixing continously. Add the lemon juice and lemon zest. Bring almost to boil -fremir in French and keep stirring with a espatula until it thickens. BE PATIENT , it might take a while and do not stop stirring.
then add 125 gr of butter, keep stirring until consistency is smooth and shinny :)
Let it cool at room temperature

 
Italian Meringue
200 gr sugar
Water to dilute the sugar
100 gr egg whites

Make a sirop with the sugar and water, when the sugar reaches the temperature of 110 °C, start whisking the egg whites . When the sirop reaches 120°C, stop cooking and drizzle the sirop in the egg white, continuing whisking - ideally you should have a standing mixer- or a helper .
Continue mixing till the bowl is cool.
 
Ensembling your cupcakes
You can now dress the cupcakes.
With the help of an appel core peeler, make a hole in the center of your cupcakes. Fill it with the lemon curd.

Frost your cupcakes with the meringue and place it under your oven gril till colored. Keep an eye on them, they color very fast!!!

Let them cool and enjoy!

Carré a la crème

 I had some pate brisé left over from another sweet done last week.

So I used this one to make carré a la crème.
to make the pate brisé or pastry dough you need:

500 gr of flour
250 ml cold water
350 gr unsalted cold butter
10 gr salt


In a food processor add the flour, salt and butter, then do seconds pulses till you get a sand texture, not too grainy. Then, add the water till it forms a dough. Take it out and wrap in a plastic bag and place on the fridge for 20 minutes.

After that, in a flour surface, extend the dough into a rectangle and fold in 3. First one side and the other side on top of the first side. This is called the first tour.
Place in a plastic bag for 10 minutes in the fridge. Do this 3 times.
Finally, take the dough out and extend it till the size of your rectangular baking plate , around 3 mm thick. Any leftover can be reused! :)

Prick dough thoroughly on the bottom with the tines of a fork to help prevent it from blistering and "puffing up" as it bakes

Bake for 10 minutes at 220 C and then 15 minutes or less at 200 C. You need to see when ready. Depending on your oven, it might take less or more.

When cool, divide your dough in 3 rectangles of the same size. the size will depend on your baking sheet. Then again, in small rectangles of the same size.

Then whisk 500 cl of cream with 100 gr of sugar till it is like chantilly, firm but not too firm that becomes butter! With a piping bag and a canelle tip fill one rectangle of dough with chantilly, add some sliced strawberries or other season fruit and place another rectangle on top, you might need to add a bit of chantilly for it to stick! Then repeat again the same filling and end up with chantiflly and strawberries.

 

My daughter enjoying this summer dessert