Sometimes it’s like a life-handing-you-lemons series of days. Well, I’m no dab hand at lemonade so the only thing to do is to make these. Plus they’re carbohydrates which makes everyone feel better. And they look like a little ray of summer sunshine which helps too. They’re good to eat pretty much at any time but I like them with tea in the afternoon. Feel free to adapt the recipe as you wish. You can add in 200g of fresh raspberries and 1/4cup of poppyseeds if you’re feeling that way inclined. You could also substitute the lemon rind for lime rind. I suspect they’re good with white chocolate chips too, about 1/2 cup’s worth. They can be iced and masqueraded as cupcakes but sometimes I like them just as they are…

Lemon Muffins
Adapted from Tom Aikens Cooking

115g butter, unsalted, soft
230g caster sugar
splash of vanilla
rind of one lemon
5 egg yolks
250ml sour cream
315g cake flour
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
3 egg whites
pinch of cream of tartar

Preheat the oven to 180C. Line 2 muffin tins with cupcake holders or grease if not using any holders.
Cream the butter, sugar, vanilla and rind until white and fluffy. Add in the yolks. Then add in the flour (and bicarb and baking powder) in 3 batches, alternating with the sour cream. In a separate bowl whisk the egg whites with the cream of tartar until stiff. Beat this into the mixture, still using a beater attachment. (The mixture is very stiff and I struggled to fold the whites in by hand as I would normally do.)

Separate the mixture into the muffin tins and bake for 15 – 20 minutes until the muffins are risen and golden.

Allow to cool in the tins before transferring to a wire rack.