Fresh Strawberry Cupcakes

Preheat oven to 170 C / Gas 3. Grease 12 holes of a cupcake tin with oil or line with cupcake cases.

Place 8 strawberries into a blender and blend until smooth. Pour the puree through a sieve to remove seeds. Puree should equal about 175ml. Set the puree aside.

In a large bowl, beat together the eggs, caster sugar, vegetable oil, 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract, lemon zest and strawberry puree until well combined. Stir in the flour, baking powder, salt, vanilla dessert mix and red food colouring to reach a desired shade of pink. Spoon the cake mixture into the prepared cupcake tin, filling each about 2/3 full.

Bake in the preheated oven until the cupcakes have risen and a skewer inserted into the centre of a cupcake comes out clean, about 23 minutes. Allow the cupcakes to cool at least 10 minutes before icing.

To make cream cheese icing, beat cream cheese and butter together in a mixing bowl with an electric mixer until smooth and mix in icing sugar and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract to make a lump-free icing. Ice each cupcake with about 2 tablespoons of icing and top each cupcake with a strawberry slice.