Mother’s Day 2019 was my first Mother’s Day ever as a mom! It was great. Last year I was still pregnant. Jeremy took EXTRA care of the baby so I could relax, AND he gifted me the Momofuku Milk Bar cookbook by Christina Tosi. Plus my parents were in town, so I had extra babysitters. I actually procrastinated on baking myself (and my mom) a dessert, but I had a can of lychee around the house. Thus, I transformed my lychee rose cupcakes into a 6 inch round cake!
The recipe is actually exactly the same. (I’ll repost the recipe down below). I just poured the batter into three six inch cake tins and baked for 25 minutes. I probably could’ve checked them at 20 minutes, though.
For the frosting, I used Bravetart’s Swiss meringue buttercream recipe and scaled it to make 3 cups of frosting. I added a little rose and almond extract to really bring out the lychee flavor of the cake. It was EXACTLY enough to frost the six inch cake and do the buttercream flower wreath. I piped all the flowers using a Wilton 102 piping tip. If you think you’re going to make some mistakes, I would make more frosting than you think you need, just in case. I don’t have a tutorial on how to pipe the flowers, but I promise you it’s not that difficult. I recommend watching a lot of Youtube if you’re interested in trying! That’s how I learned!
When I piped the flowers, I had originally intended to do a full wreath. After sloppily piping the little border and placing a few flowers, however, I realized I really liked the minimal look! I decided to continue with the full wreath anyway since I had already made all the flowers. But I still think the minimal or even asymmetrical half wreath look is pretty neat.
Here’s the recipe. Keep everything the same, just pour batter into three 6 inch round cake tins and bake.
Lychee Cupcakes with Lychee Rose Buttercream
Ingredients
Lychee Cupcakes
- 1 20 oz can lychee, drained (save the syrup!)
- 1 stick softened unsalted butter (4 oz)
- 3/4 cup sugar (145g)
- 1 1/4 tsp baking powder
- 1/8 tsp baking soda
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/4 cup egg whites (from about 2 eggs)
- 1 1/4 cup cake flour (155g)
- 1/8 tsp almond extract
- 1/8 tsp rose water
Lychee rose buttercream
- 2 sticks softened unsalted butter (8 oz)
- 1 pinch salt
- 2-3 cups powdered sugar
- 2-3 tbsp lychee syrup
- 1/2 tsp almond extract
- 1/4 tsp rose water
Instructions
For the cupcakes
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F and line a cupcake tin with 12 liners.
- Measure out 200 g of drained lychee from the can. If you don’t have a kitchen scale, this will be about the entire can, minus 4-5 lychees.
- Puree the lychee in a blender. You should have about 3/4 cup of lychee puree.
- Cream butter, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and sugar until light and fluffy.
- Add egg whites and blend until emulsified.
- Mixing on low, alternate adding small batches of lychee puree and cake flour until fully incorporated.
- Add almond extract and rose water and mix.
- Scoop batter into cupcake liners and bake for 25-30 minutes, or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean.
- Let cool while preparing the buttercream.
For the lychee rose buttercream
- Beat softened butter and salt until fluffy.
- Add powdered sugar and 2-3 tbsp of the reserved lychee syrup until the buttercream is your desired consistency. Remember that your kitchen temperature will also affect how thick or thin your buttercream appears.
- Mix in almond extract and rose water.
- Frost cupcakes when cool. Enjoy!
In hindsight, I think next time I would use a raspberry jam or passionfruit curd in between the layers. The overall effect was a little one-dimensionally sweet. It would’ve been even better with a little hint of acidity or saltiness. Maybe a pretzel crunch? If you have any good ideas let me know! And if you’re looking for more lychee recipes, don’t forget to check out my lychee coconut jello! Hope you all had a great Mother’s Day 🙂