Angel Food Cupcakes with Blueberry Filling and Meringue Icing

I love angel food cake, and I've always just had the box mix, but I always wondered how angel food made from scratch would be, so this past weekend I decided to find out! :)

I looked through some online recipes and decided to try one out that I found on allrecipes.com, so I made a few slight changes and it turned out awesome!! But instead of doing a cake in a fluted pan, I did mini and big cupcakes and then I injected them with blueberry pie filling and topped them off with meringue icing. Turns out a big part of making angel food cake is making a meringue first and then folding the flour into it. Because meringue is so low fat, these are not that bad for you at all!

For all my friends on Weight Watchers, these are a lighter, "skinnier" dessert. I only counted a mini cupcake as 2 points (but if you want to be safe since I didn't actually calculate it - round up to 3 points for a mini cupcake).

Cake
1 cup cake and pastry flour
1 1/2 cups white sugar
1 1/2 cups of egg whites
1 tbsp vanilla extract
1 tbsp almond extract
1 1/2 tsps cream of tartar
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup blueberry pie filling

Icing
1/2 cup white sugar
1 tsp cream of tartar
1/2 cup egg whites

For the cake

Preheat the oven to 375 F.

Prep your pan by lining your muffin tins with cupcake liners.

Sift together the flour and 3/4 cup of sugar and set aside.

In a large bowl, whip the egg whites along with the vanilla, cream of tartar and salt until you have medium to stiff peaks in the mixture. Gradually add the remaining sugar while continuing to whip until the mixture has stiff peaks.

When the egg mixture has reached its maximum volume, fold in the flour/sugar mixture gradually, one third at a time. Do not overmix.

Fill the cupcake liners 3/4 of the way full and pop into the oven for about 12 - 15 minutes, until the cupcakes are a nice golden color.

Refridgerate the remaining batter until your ready to do the next batch.

Pour the blueberry pie filling through a large strainer to catch the berries (so you're only left with the sauce). Once the cupcakes have cooled a bit, spoon the blueberry pie sauce into a pastry bag with a large round tip and use it to puncture the top of the cupcakes and gently squeeze the filling into them one at a time.


For the icing

In a medium bowl whip together the egg whites and cream of tartar together until foamy and you start to get medium peaks.

Add in the sugar while continuing to whip into stiff peaks.

Spoon into a piping bag and frost the cupcakes as desired.