Pink Lemonade Cupcakes

Recipe Review- The perfect summer cupcake- tastes just like a glass of pink lemonade.

I've taken a break from cupcakes lately. It's summer and with that comes a million social obligations and the calendar fills up fast. Also its the busiest season for my job so I've been putting in some extra hours. To top it all off we don't have air conditioning- its usually not too bad, but turn the oven on and it gets HOT. Well it had been about a month and I got the cupcake itch again. My good friend Liz was leaving her job to go back to school, so I decided to make some cupcakes to help her celebrate. I needed a summer-ey cupcake, that was refreshing and bright. Whats more summer than Lemonade! Specifically Pink Lemondae, just so I could make the cupcakes super pretty and girly for Liz.

After referencing various blogs online I deciding on adding powdered lemonade mix to my go to vanilla cupcake recipe. The result? Cupcakes that tasted exactly like lemondae! They were sweet with a little sour zing at the end. Really refreshing.

Pink Lemonade Cupcakes

adapted from Vanilla Cupcakes by Amy Sedaris

yield: 24 cupcakes

1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter at room temperature

1 3/4 cups sugar

2 large eggs

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

2 1/2 cups flour

1 cup milk 

2 packets of Pink Lemonade flavor "On The Go" Crystal Light

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and grease or line a cupcake pan with paper liners.

In a large bowl cream together butter and sugar. Beat in eggs one at a time. Add salt, and baking powder.

Add Crystal Light to the milk and stir until combined. Add flour in three batches, alternating with the milk mixture. Mix until batter is smooth with no lumps, but do not over beat.

Divide batter evenly among cups, and bake for 18- 20 minutes or until tops are just golden and toothpick inserted into center comes out clean. Cool on rack to room temperature before frosting.

printable recipe

I frosted with a basic butter cream, and added another packet of crystal light to it. The frosting really absorbed the lemonade flavor so be careful and add it a little at a time. The cake batter tasted too sour before baking, but it mellowed a bunch so don't worry about that. I added a little bit of pink Wilton Gel Color to both the frosting and the batter, to give it a better pink color. I piped the frosting on with a closed star tip,  and then topped with some gummy candy that I got a local candy store.

So pretty! Love it :-)

P.S. feeling lazy? A bunch of the recipes that I referenced online were adding the crystal light to a boxed vanilla cake mix. I made them from scratch but I thought that I'd throw the info out there.