TIO Tuesday - Pink Lemonade Cupcakes

My sister's baby shower is coming up this weekend. I am in the midst of getting everything ready and figured it might be a good idea to try out this recipe before I serve it on Saturday. You just never know if something will turn out like you think, so these are my trial run. I'm glad I made them, they definitely are a keeper. The kids all tried them and thought they tasted better than the Lemon Drop cupcake from Scratch. I'll take that compliment!

There's a lot of lemon flavor to these, you can even see the lemon zest. I will make them look a little prettier on Saturday. And I'm not quite sure how I will frost them, I was thinking of making them look more like flowers? I have the cupcake toppers all ready to go for them, so the coloring will all match. I will also add the coloring to the frosting, which I didn't do on these.
Pink Lemonade Cupcakes
Cake:

• 1 (16.25 oz) package white cake mix
• 1 small package (3.4 oz) vanilla instant pudding
• 3 Tbsp sweetened pink lemonade drink mix (like Country Time Pink Lemonade mix)
• 1 cup sour cream
• 2 tsp lemon zest
• 3/4 cup water
• 3/4 cup oil
• 4 whites eggs
• 6 drops of pink food coloring

Frosting:

• 1 cup butter, softened
• 1 cup shortening
• 1/2 cup frozen pink lemonade concentrate, thawed
• 2 tablespoons milk
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• Zest from 1 lemon
• 2 pound package or 7 1/2 cups confectioners sugar
• 3 drops of pink food coloring

Decorations:

• 24 lemon slice candies or grapefruit slice candies
• 12 colored flexible drinking straws

1. In a large bowl, whisk cake mix, pudding mix, and drink mix together. Add sour cream, lemon zest, water, oil, and egg whites to the dry mix. Beat with electric mixer on medium speed for about two minutes. Use a strong mixer, this batter is thick.
2. Scoop batter into 24 lined muffin tins. Bake at 350 degrees for 15-20 minutes until cupcakes don’t look wet and a toothpick inserted in one comes out clean. Allow to cool completely before frosting the cupcakes.
3. Prepare the frosting by creaming butter, shortening, and lemon zest together. Then add lemonade concentrate, milk and vanilla with a mixer. Beat until smooth. Then gradually add the sugar, mixing well until light and fluffy. Beat in the food coloring.
4. Pipe frosting onto the cupcakes. (You will have plenty to pile it on. I had over 1 cup leftover. Leftover frosting is good sandwiched between two graham crackers). Place a lemon candy wedge on top of each cupcakes. With the straws cut the top 1/3 of the straw off just below the flexible part. Discard the tops. Then cut the remaining straw pieces in half. Place one straw piece in each cupcake to resemble a drink.

****My notes: I substituted one cup of butter for the shortening, so a total of 2 cups of butter. I had a lot left over! Everything else was as noted in the recipe.

Enjoy!