Two Chefs, A Little Lady and Liam Bruce: Wedding cupcakes; lemon meringue cupcakes

So the wedding cupcake process started a few weeks ago. I wanted to do something special for my friend lauras wedding 2.0. I made cupcakes for her original wedding back in December when her and Cory had a rather quick wedding to include her ailing father. Since his passing Laura and Cory decided to have a second wedding of sorts to include additional family and friends.

I decided a few weeks ago I should test out the new recipe I found online before I attempt to make to make 90 cupcakes for the actual reception!

http://comfortablefood.com/lemon-meringue-cupcakes/

This lemon curd was the easiest curd I've ever made and it was oh so delicious; perfectly tart! Jeff couldn't believe the process and that it didn't require a double boiler. He also couldn't believe I used "real lemon" from the bottle (just to see how it would work). He was dumb-founded thinking his palate had betrayed him since he couldn't tell the curd wasn't made from fresh lemon juice. For the wedding cupcakes I did end up using juice from fresh lemons but going forward I wouldn't hesitate to use "real lemon" if lemons are $1.29 a piece!

Moment of truth!

Eaten cold or room temperature they sure were delicious. Perfect balance of tart and sweet and the cake had a pound-cake quality about it. I also loved the flavour from the torched meringue.

I was so excited to make these for the wedding. I made a few adjustments to the recipe from the comments I saw on the website and they were right on point.

I added 1 egg yolk to the lemon curd and followed the directions as stated. I also baked the cupcakes for 30 minutes at 325F. In my muffin tins each recipe made 15 cupcakes and I had leftover curd; which is never a bad thing....trifle anyone?!

So here we were yesterday, the bridesmaids. We had such a fun time together. Once the day actually arrived it was very clear that our friend was having a torn sense of things. Of course she'd give up the whole party just to have her dad back. So we did the only thing we could do and rallied around our friend. We were all there for one reason, to be with our friend. There are some things in life you'll never understand but with compassion and love you can do the "Jesus-thing" and just "be there".

This was the tribute Laura's mom added to her bouquet in honour of her dad. Such a beautiful reminder.

So wedding cupcakes 2.0 turned out great. I would most definitly make these again. I also would use that cake recipe again if I needed a "white" cake recipe. The lemon zest and vanilla added great flavour and the pound cake-like texture is always enjoyable.