Mango lassi is great. Cupcakes are also great. So I thought it would be fun to put them together and make mango lassi cupcakes.
THE FLAVOUR OF THESE CUPCAKES WAS AMAZING, and the smell was so good.
I feel like cupcakes are never really described as refreshing, but these felt refreshing, I loved them.
Video Tutorial
What makes these mango lassi cupcakes?
If you’ve never heard of, or had mango lassi before, it is a drink that is very popular in Pakistan and India.
It’s usually made with mangos, plain yoghurt, and some milk. Cardamom is also added for flavour.
It just a nice, refreshing sweet drink.
For this recipe, my goal was to take the flavours of mango lassi and add them to the cupcakes. I would say that the main flavours of mango lassi are mangos and cardamom.
So I added cardamom powder to the cupcake batter, for the cardamom flavour. Then for the mango flavour, I made a mango curd and filled the cupcakes with this.
To finish them off, I topped them with whipped cream and added mango pieces.
Then I also bought some mini pipettes from Amazon. I made a mango lassi and filled the pipettes with this. This is optional, you don’t need to do it at all, but it was a nice addition.
Now you’ve got mango lassi cupcakes!
The mango curd
The first thing we are going to make is the mango curd, just because this takes the longest to cool down and thicken up.
Making mango curd is pretty much the same as making lemon curd. The only difference is that we go lighter on the lemon juice, and then add mango puree or pulp to it.
So to make this, all you need is:
- Mango pulp
- Egg yolks
- Granulated sugar
- Salt
- Lemon juice
- Unsalted butter
To make it, you just heat all the ingredients, except the butter, over simmering water.
You want to heat this until the mixture thickens slightly. This might take a while, it took around 15 minutes for me. It might not look like it’s thickening, but it will eventually.
Just don’t try increasing the heat to speed up the process, we don’t want the eggs to cook. And also constantly stir, again we don’t want the eggs to cook.
But then after just mix in the butter, push the curd through a sieve, then leave this to chill in your fridge.
Mango pulp or mango puree?
For the lemon curd, I used mango pulp instead of getting fresh mangos and pureeing it.
Here’s the thing, when you use mango pulp for baking or for mango lassi, you know for sure that this pulp is going to have a good flavour and also going to be sweet.
But with mangos, and most fruits, there is no guarantee that they’re going to be good. You could end up with mangos that are not very sweet, or have a disappointing flavour.
So for this recipe, I found it best to just use mango pulp from a can instead. This way I could get good flavour and sweetness in the curd. And also it’s so much easier, you don’t need to peel, chop and puree a bunch of mangos, you can just open a can.
However, if you have great juicy flavourful mangos, you of course can use this. Just puree them and make sure you have 300g of puree.
By the way, I used the ‘KTC Kesar Mango Pulp’, but you can use whichever one you like or can find.
The cupcake batter
So for the cupcake batter, all I did was make a regular vanilla cupcake batter, but I added cardamom powder to it.
Side note, I LOVE CARDAMOM POWDER, it’s a great ingredient, I added it to a lot of desserts just for extra flavour.
I digress, here are the ingredients I used to make this cupcake batter:
- Unsalted butter – we’re using self-raising flour for these cupcakes, a lot of self-raising flours already have salt in them. So it’s best to use unsalted butter so that cupcakes don’t end up too salty.
- Oil – for moisture. I use vegetable oil, but any flavourless oil works.
- Sugar – I used a mixture of both granulated sugar and brown sugar. I added the brown sugar just for some extra flavour and moisture.
- Cardamom powder – for flavour.
- Vanilla extract – also for flavour.
- Eggs
- Self-raising flour – I find it easier to just use self-raising flour for cupcakes, but I will talk about how to use plain/all-purpose flour in the next section.
- Milk – whole milk is best to use.
Ingredient substitutions
There are a few ingredients that I used for the cupcake batter that I typically get asked for substitutions for.
So let’s talk about them:
The oil
Cakes typically need some kind of fat in them. This can either be butter or oil.
Butter adds flavour, whereas oil adds moisture.
When it comes to vanilla cakes and cupcakes, I like to use a mixture of both, just so that I can get good flavour AND good moisture.
But if you wanted to leave the oil out and only use butter, you could.
In the recipe card below, it says to use 125g of butter and 125ml of oil. If you are leaving the oil out, use 250g of butter instead.
The brown sugar
Like I mentioned, I used a mixture or regular white sugar and brown sugar.
I used light brown soft sugar.
I used this just for some extra flavour, I think the slight caramely flavour that brown sugar gives goes well with the cardamom flavour.
But if you didn’t have brown sugar, you can just use white sugar.
Just like the butter, use 250g of granulated sugar, instead of 125g.
The self-raising flour
If you don’t have self-raising flour, or live in a place where it’s not easy to find, plain/all-purpose flour works too.
Use the same amount but mix 2.5 teaspoons of baking powder and 1/4 teaspoon of salt into it.
The whipped cream
This is the last thing we needed to make.
I wanted these cupcakes to be light and refreshing, so I decided to top them with some whipped cream.
If you wanted to use buttercream, or anything else, you could. But I went with whipped cream.
You only need 3 ingredients for this:
- Double cream – also known as heavy cream. If you live in a place that doesn’t have this, whipping cream works too.
- Icing sugar – also known as powdered sugar. In the recipe card, I’ve said to use 200g. This amount is adjustable, if you want a less sweet whipped cream, add less sugar. Or if you want a sweeter one, add more.
- Vanilla extract – for flavour.
To make this, all you need to do is whip these 3 ingredient together until you get firm peaks.
How to fix over whipped cream
Try not to over whip this cream, as soon as you get firm peaks, stop whipping it.
If you over whip it, it will end up too thick and it won’t be very smooth. This will make it difficult to pipe it onto the cupcakes.
If you do over whip it though, DON’T WORRY it’s very easy to fix.
All you need to do is add some un-whipped cream into this, and whisk this in. Keep repeating this until it goes back to being smooth and having firm peaks.
The only time where this won’t work is if you have over whipped it to a point where the cream has turned into butter. So try not to get to this point.
Assembling
Now that everything has been made, you can put the cupcakes together.
Just cut a hole in the centre of the cupcakes and fill this with the mango curd. Then you can decorate however you want.
Storing these cupcakes
This recipe makes around 12-15 cupcakes.
If you have any cupcakes leftover, these need to be stored in the fridge, because of the whipped cream.
So just put them in an air tight container and place them in them fridge. They will last in there for about 3-4 days.
The mango lassi
I just wanted to quickly talk about the lassi that I used for the pipettes.
I didn’t follow a recipe for this, all I did was blend some mango pulp, yoghurt, milk and cardamom powder together. I just did this to taste.
If you wanted it to be sweeter, you could also add some sugar or honey.
There are a lot of recipes online for mango lassi. If you did decide to add the pipettes to the cupcakes, you could follow one of those. But honestly, I say just make it to taste. You don’t really need a recipe.
Side note, I like mango lassi that is on the thicker side, but for the pipettes, you do need it to be thinner. Otherwise it will be too hard to fill the pipettes with it. So use extra milk!
Here are a few other cupcake recipes that I think you might like:
Mango
Lassi Cupcakes
Ingredients
Makes: 12-15 cupcakes
- For the mango curd:
300g mango pulp
6 egg yolks
50g granulated sugar (you can add more if you want a sweeter curd, or less if you want a less sweet one)
1/8 teaspoon salt
50ml lemon juice
120g unsalted butter
- For the cupcakes:
125g unsalted butter, softened
125ml vegetable oil
125g granulated sugar
125g soft light brown sugar
1 tablespoon cardamom powder
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
4 eggs
250g self-raising flour
60ml whole milk
- For the whipped cream:
600ml double cream
200g icing sugar (add more or less depending on how sweet you want this)
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- Extras:
1 mango cut into cubes, to put on top of the cupcakes
Some extra cardamom powder, to sprinkle on top of the cupcakes
I also filled some mini pipettes with mango lassi to add on top, this is very optional
Directions
- Making the mango curd:
- Add some water into a pot and place this onto medium heat. Let this come to a simmer.
- In a bowl, add the mango pulp, egg yolks, sugar, salt and lemon juice. Whisk all this together then place this bowl on top of the pot with the simmering water in it. Make sure that the water isn't touching the bottom of the bowl, if it is, pour some of the water out.
- Heat this mixture, whiles constantly stirring, until the mixture thickens. It won't become super thick but you will notice a difference, it will be thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. This might take a while, it took about 15 minutes for me.
- Once it has thickened, take it off the heat and add the butter. Whisk until all the butter has melted.
- At this point, push this mixture through a sieve just to get out any lumps. Cover with cling film, making sure that the cling film is touching the surface of the mango curd, then leave this in the fridge to cool completely and thicken up.
- Making the cupcakes:
- Start by pre-heating your oven to 180c/350f. Also add your cupcake cases into your cupcake tin.
- In a large bowl, add the butter, oil, granulated sugar, brown sugar, cardamom powder and vanilla. Using an electric mixer, whip these on medium-high speed for 5 minutes. If you are making this by hand, just aggressively whisk for as long as you can.
- Add 2 of the eggs into this, whisk these in. Then add the remaining 2 eggs and whisk.
- Now add the flour and milk, whisk just until you get a smooth batter.
- Fill your cupcakes cases with this batter, you want them to be around 3/4 of the way full.
- Bake for around 25-30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean. Once baked, leave to cool completely.
- Making the whipped cream:
- In a large bowl, add the double cream, icing sugar and vanilla.
- Whip all this together until the mixture thickens and you get firm peaks.
- Leave this in the fridge until you're ready to use.
- Assembling the cupcakes:
- Once everything has been made and the cupcakes and mango curd have cooled completely, you can put everyhting together.
- Using a small knife or an apple corer, cut a hole in the centre of your cupcakes. Make sure not to go right to the bottom of the cupcakes.
- Fill these holes with your mango curd. You can either do this using a piping bag, or you can spoon the filling in.
- Now pipe the whipped cream on top using a large star tip, then decorate however you want. I just sprinkled some cardamom powder of them, added a piece of mango on each one and then added mini pipettes that I filled with mango lassi.
- Now they're done enjoy!
these look amazing but i want to try this with a whipped yogurt or yogurt cream to make it extra lassi
Author
yessss this would be so good
just a question, where did the lemon curd came from at instruction number 5 at Making the mango curd
Author
this is awkward…i’ve fixed it now lmao