Lemon and Blueberry Giant Cupcake

Today is Chinese New Year so Happy New Year to everyone who is celebrating today. This is not a typical Chinese New Year cake but it is a celebration cake which I actually made for a colleague's birthday recently. It's still Jan and we are still on the health kick so this is a lighter lemon and blueberry cake made with low fat yoghurt. It's filled with homemade lemon curd and topped with a vanilla buttercream frosting. The cake was light and moist due to the yoghurt and full of blueberries which are good for you! The lemon curd was absolutely divine and I think it was the highlight of the cake. 

 ready to go in the oven 

 homemade lemon curd filling 

 Love the colour of the blueberries! 

For the cupcake
200g self raising flour
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
75g golden caster sugar
250g blueberries
Zest and juice of 1 lemon
2 eggs
150mls low fat yoghurt
50mls sunflower/vegetable oil

For the icing
100g butter
200g icing sugar
juice of 1/2 lemon (optional) or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla bean paste

Lemon curd
1/2 cup fresh lemon juice
115g sugar
2 large eggs
2 large egg yolks
pinch of salt
85g butter

• Preheat the oven to 170C.
• Sift flour and bicarbonate of soda in a medium bowl.
• Stir in sugar, blueberries and lemon zest. 
• Add eggs, yoghurt, oil and lemon juice in the centre and mix well. 
• Divide into a giant cupcake mould and fill it to about 2/3 full. 
• Bake for approximately 40-45 minutes or until well risen, golden brown and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. 
• Allow to cool completely before decorating. 
• To make the lemon curd, place a fine mesh sieve over a medium bowl and set aside.
• In a medium pot, whisk together the lemon juice, sugar, egg yolks and pinch of salt.
• Place the pot over a medium-low heat and add the butter.
• Stir the mixture with a whisk. You may want to use a spatula to scrape down the edges. 
• Cook the curd until the butter is melted and the mixture is the thickness of warm hot fudge. 
• Remove from the heat and immediately pour into the fine mesh sieve over a medium bowl. 
• Press through the sieve leaving any cooked egg bits in the strainer.
• To make icing, mix all ingredients in an electric stand mixer until smooth. You can make lemon or vanilla icing - I ran out of lemons so made a vanilla icing here. 
• Cut the bottom half of the cupcake in half and fill with lemon curd.
• Put more lemon curd in between the top and bottom half of the giant cupcake.
• Spread a thin layer of frosting around the outside of the bottom half of the cupcake.
• Arrange chocolate fingers as shown.
• Pipe rosettes on the top half of the giant cupcake and decorate with sprinkles.