Coconut Lime Cupcakes

These are fabulous and my new summer cupcake love! I ran across this recipe in a Betty Crocker cooking magazine and put my own twist on it. They were so yummy and really perfect for summer! I will definitely be making more of these before the summer is over. If you are not a fan of coconut, you can simply omit it. I actually made half without coconut and half with. I just added the coconut after I baked the first dozen. Both ways turned out great! If you decide to make half and half like I did, I suggest you decrease the coconut to 1/2 cup...unless, of course, you are crazy for coconut.

Coconut Lime Cupcakes

1 box Lemon cake mix

1 small box lime-flavored jello

1 1/4 cup water

1/3 cup vegetable oil

3 eggs

1 cup shredded coconut

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Prepare cupcake pan(s). In large bowl, beat cake mix and gelatin with mixer on low speed for 30 seconds. Add remaining cupcake ingredients (except coconut) and mix on low/med for 5-7 minutes. Stir in the shredded coconut. Fill cupcake pan with batter and bake 17 to 22 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan 10 minutes. Remove from pan to cooling rack. With toothpick, pierce tops of cupcakes in several places.

Glaze

1 cup powdered sugar

2 to 2 1/2 tablespoons lime juice

In small bowl, mix 1 cup powdered sugar and enough of the 2 to 2 1/2 tablespoons lime juice until glaze is smooth and thin enough to drizzle. Drizzle and spread glaze over cupcakes. Cool completely, about 30 minutes.

**You can stop right now if you are not a frosting person. The cupcakes will taste wonderful with only the glaze on top. They just looked so good I had to try one! However, being that I LOVE frosting (especially cream cheese frosting) I proceeded with the next step.

Frosting

1 8 oz package cream cheese, softened

1/4 cup butter or margarine, softened

1 teaspoon vanilla

3 1/2 cups powdered sugar

In a large bowl, beat cream cheese and butter on medium speed until light and fluffy. On low speed, beat in vanilla and 3 1/2 cups powdered sugar until mixed; beat on medium speed until fluffy. Frost cupcakes as desired. Store covered in refrigerator.

I almost always use tip 1M from Wilton when frosting my cupcakes. It's so quick and easy to use and the end result is a nicely frosted cupcake. If you have kids and bake a lot of cupcakes (like myself), but don't own any tips and/or decorating bags, I highly suggest you purchase these items. They will make your life so much easier when it comes to frosting cupcakes. Not only will your cupcakes look beautiful, but people will think you spent hours frosting them.

Two of the cupcakes are frosted with the cream cheese frosting and the other two have only the glaze.