Wow, two cupcake posts in one week! The other day I shared my Scooby-Doo Yellow Buttermilk Cupcakes, and today I give you these Triple Citrus Cupcakes. They sounded like they would be light, summery, and refreshing! They were chosen by Marthe of Culinairy Delights for the Martha Stewart Cupcakes Club, and I was really looking forward to trying them.
Well, unfortunately, these fell a little bit short of my expectations for them. I know that sometimes Martha's cupcake recipes have a reputation for being a bit dry, or dense, or too muffin-like, and I felt like that was the case with these particular cupcakes. They almost reminded me of cornbread in texture, and although cornbread can be delicious, it doesn't necessarily scream light and fluffy.
They're pretty easy to make, though! That fun picture of my stand mixer you saw earlier was all the beautiful, colorful citrus zest that went in with the butter and sugar. It smelled absolutely amazing! I did think 4 sticks of butter in one cupcake recipe was a tad ridiculous, but I went with it.
After the zest mixes in with the butter/sugar mixture, you add vanilla, then 9 (yes, 9!) eggs. Then the flour and salt goes in, and that's it for the batter. While I was making these, I found it odd that there was no baking soda or baking powder in the recipe. Again, I went with it. I figured Martha knew what she was doing.
The cupcakes were heavy, indeed, but the flavor was very nice. I loved the delicate citrus flavor throughout, and I could envision these being eaten without glaze for breakfast. With the glaze, though, they did become much more dessert-y. It's just a simple powdered sugar/citrus juice glaze, with a bit of zest sprinkled in. My cupcakes seemed to absorb some of the glaze; it didn't sit all nice and thick on top of the cupcake like the one in the picture in the cookbook did.
I have to say, though, that my review of these cupcakes was just my opinion. Andy took these in to work, and they were very well-received there. People really loved them; I even heard they were hiding them from other people in the building! So it just goes to show you, it's all a matter of taste. Do check out what the other Martha bloggers thought of these, over at the MSCC blogroll! You can also find the full recipe here, on Martha's website.
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I also thought that these were too dense and muffin-like! I always want my cupcakes to be light and fluffy. I am glad that they were well received at work, I brought mine to work to get rid of them as well.
ReplyDeleteMy cupcakes absorbed a lot of the glaze as well so I ended up putting on two or three layers of it! haha.
ReplyDeleteWell, I made them, with Marthe, as it happens on Twitter and we had a great time, I took the photos, etc. and then something happened to the photos...I have two teenage sons with free use of my camera, so I am thinking it involved them as my photos are gone. No photos, no post in my mind, and they weren't actually that good to want to repeat them, so I am just going to say here that yours look wonderful and that I agree with your assessment of the taste, etc. Next month I will have a better handle on that camera situation. Hopefully.
ReplyDeleteYour cupcakes still look delicious!
ReplyDeleteI have given up using any of Martha's butter-based cupcake recipes, figuring they will be dry and dense. So I have been swapping out the butter for oil.
Thanks for baking along, darling!
xo