Mini Spiced Ginger Cupcakes with Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients:
3/4 cups turbinado sugar (or maple sugar)
1/2 cup butter
2 large eggs
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 tsp white vinegar
1/2 cup plain Greek Yogurt
1/2 cup milk
1 cup spelt flour
2/3 cup quinoa flour
1/3 cup almond flour
1 tbsp ground ginger
2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp sea salt
1/4 tsp baking powder

Frosting:
6 oz. cream cheese, softened
1/3 cup turbinado sugar
1/2 cup plain Greek yogurt
the juice from one lemon
the zest from one lemon, including some for garnish

How To:
Preheat oven to 350 and line 48 mini muffin tin cups with paper cupcake liners.

• In a large mixing bowl - add the sugar, buttery spread, eggs, vanilla, and vinegar and beat with a hand mixture on medium until smooth and fluffy.
• In a medium bowl - combine flour, ginger, pumpkin pie spice, baking soda, salt, and baking powder.
• In a small bowl - combine milk and yogurt.

Beginning with the flour mixture, alternately fold flour mixture and yogurt mixture into egg mixture making three additions of flour and two additions of yogurt. Fold only until flour is smooth and just combined. (For the record, I actually dumped mine into the bowl in three sets and mixed with the hand mixer and all went well, but the instructions above are the "official" way to add the ingredients together).

Spoon about 1 1/2 tbsp batter into each cupcake liner (you'll have 48 total) and bake in center of oven for 12-14 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. Let cool for at least an hour, but you can remove from the tin after 15 minutes.

In the meantime, in another bowl, combine the frosting ingredients, reserving a little zest to sprinkle on top. Blend together and frost cupcakes with about 1 tsp of frosting, top with zest and serve immediately.

Note - Cupcakes are best when iced just befor serving. Keep icing refrigerated and store cupcakes in a sealed container in a cool, dark place up to two days.

Comments:
This recipe is modified from Clean Eating August/September 2011; however, their recipe uses 2 cups of a gluten-free flour blend, which I would have used if I would have had it on hand. Also they use maple sugar flakes instead of turbinado sugar, but I only had the sugar. I have to say, I normally wouldn't have made a dessert with so much added sugar, but was looking for a treat and I think these were really nice. The boy loved them and was very unhappy only being able to have two.

 

 

This post was shared on Tasteful Tuesdays, Tasty Tuesdays, and Melt in Your Mouth Mondays. I also linked this recipe to a cupcake blog carnival but accidentally forgot to copy the link here. If that is your carnival, please leave me a comment and let me know where I should link because I cannot remember, for the life of me, where it was! Ugh, so sorry.