The two biggest food items I took away from Maine were blueberries and honey. One of the winemakers we visited noted, “We’re in Maine, so there’s practically a law that blueberries need to be in everything.” Both were everywhere. I was very disappointed to learn when we got there that Maine’s blueberry season starts in August, meaning no fresh blueberries or blueberry picking for me. But I still tried to indulge when I could–blueberry jam, blueberry ice cream, even blueberry butter at the Lucerne Inn! I did pick up some blueberry honey at the Blue Hill Food Co-op, but stayed away from the blueberry syrup (I’ll stick with good old maple syrup, thank you).

So, when I got back to Brooklyn, I still had blueberries on the brain. Plus, I recently read Romancing the Bees blog post about honey cupcakes. I was inspired. Honey’s tasty and blueberries are pretty awesome, how good could they be together? So I experimented and whipped up some pretty tasty blueberry cupcakes with blueberry honey icing, kind of a last goodbye to our vacation in Maine.

Cupcake Trio

To make the cupcakes, I used a basic vanilla cupcake mix and added some blueberries. For the icing I made a butter-cream cheese icing and added some Maine blueberry honey. Voila! Cupcake goodness!

Blueberry Cupcakes

• 1 1/2 c. sifted cake flour
• 1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 1/2 c. sugar
• 1/2 c. (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
• 2 large eggs, room temperature
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1/2 c. whole milk
• 1 c. blueberries (I used 1/2 c. whole and 1/2 c. smashed for variety)

Heat oven to 400°F. Line 12 cup muffin pan with cupcake liners. Sift flour, baking powder, salt and sugar into large bowl. Beat in butter 1 tbsp at a time until mixture is course and crumbly. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Add vanilla and milk until just mixed. Then add blueberries and mix until blended. Fill cupcake liners evenly and bake for 15-20 min.

Butter-Cream Cheese Icing

• 1/2 c. (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
• 4oz low fat cream cheese
• 1/4 c. honey (I used Maine blueberry honey)
• 2-3 c. powdered sugar

Cream butter, cream cheese and honey together until light and fluffy. Gradually beat in powdered sugar (2-3 tbsp at a time) until desired taste and thickness is achieved. Ice cupcakes and enjoy!

Cupcake Closeup

Blueberry filled: this was actually one of the more modest filled ones–some were exploding!