Keto Lemon Cupcakes with Blueberries
By Carine Claudepierre
Published on 12/09/2019 - Last updated on 11/10/2023
This recipe may contain Amazon or other affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
Indulge with no guilt with this sugar-free cupcake recipe! A moist keto lemon cupcake with blueberry and only 4 grams of net carbs per serving.
Are Lemon Cupcakes Keto?
Classic Lemon Cupcakes are not keto-friendly because they are made with sugar and all-purpose flour, and the frosting is made with sugar.
But this Keto Lemon Cupcake recipe is very low in carbs!
Is lemon keto?
Of course, lemon is one of the lowest-carb fruits, with only 6 grams of net carbs per 100 grams.
Plus, the great thing about lemon is that you only need a small amount to enhance food flavor.
So it doesn’t bring many carbs to your sugar-free recipes.
Why You’ll Love These Cupcakes
These Keto Cupcakes with Almond Flour are delicious and they are:
- Gluten-Free
- Paleo
- Low-Carb
- Keto-Friendly
- Ready In Under 40 Minutes
How To Make Keto Cupcakes With Almond Flour
These almond flour lemon cupcakes are keto-friendly, gluten-free, and sugar-free.
The recipe uses wholesome keto ingredients that we all have in the pantry on the keto diet.
The trick to succeeding with this recipe is to bring all ingredients to room temperature before you start.
In fact, any cold ingredients would harden the butter or create lumps.
Ingredients
- Soft unsalted butter – dairy-free butter can be used if you don’t tolerate butter but note that most use vegetable oils that are not keto-friendly. Learn why butter is keto-friendly!
- Lemon zest – use the zest of your lemon only if they are organic and untreated!
- Sugar-free crystal sweetener – monk fruit blends, erythritol, or xylitol. Read my keto sweetener guide and learn how to convert sweeteners!
- Lemon juice – at room temperature.
- Almond flour, not a coarse almond meal! Read more about choosing your keto flours.
- Coconut flour – fresh without lumps.
- Eggs – the recipe won’t work with flax eggs without changing the sort of flour. It means that if you are vegan, you will have to use higher-carb flour to make this sugar-free cupcakes recipe egg-free. Consequently, the recipe won’t be keto anymore.
- Baking powder or half the amount in baking soda.
- Vanilla
Making Keto Lemon Buttercream Frosting
The best part of those sugar-free lemon cupcakes is the frosting. Note that if you don’t like buttercream frosting, you can also use my Keto Cream Cheese Frosting.
This sweet, fluffy keto lemon buttercream frosting can be eaten on top of your cupcakes or on its own.
In fact, it has barely any carbs and makes a delicious fat bomb snack for frosting lovers.
It is a very easy keto buttercream frosting recipe that you can use for any sugar-free cupcake recipe.
The key to success is to use all your ingredients at room temperature.
- Butter – make sure it is soft, and unsalted at room temperature for at least 3 hours before using it in this recipe.
- Lemon stevia drops or natural lemon extract.
- Unsweetened almond milk
- Powdered sugar-free sweetener – I love Monk fruit stevia erythritol blends, but pure erythritol or xylitol work as well.
More Keto Lemon Recipes
If you love lemon recipes, I have got plenty of other low carb lemon recipes to try:
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Keto Lemon Cupcakes
Ingredients
- ⅓ cup Unsalted Butter soft, at room temperature for 3 hours (or dairy-free butter)
- ½ cup Granulated Sweetener erythritol or monk fruit or xylitol
- 1 tablespoon Lemon Zest organic, untreated lemons
- 3 large Eggs at room temperature, not cold
- 2 cups Almond Flour
- ¼ cup Coconut Flour
- ½ tablespoon Baking Powder
- ¼ cup Unsweetened Almond Milk at room temperature
- ¼ cup Lemon Juice at room temperature
- 1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
- ¾ cup Blueberries fresh or frozen (optional)
Keto lemon buttercream frosting
- 1 cup Unsalted Butter soft, at room temperature, out of the fridge 3 hours
- 6-10 drops Lemon Stevia Drops
- 3 cups Powdered Erythritol
- 2-3 tablespoons Unsweetened Almond Milk at room temperature, not cold
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350°F (180°C).
- Line a 12-hole muffin pan with paper cups. Set aside.
- In a large mixing bowl, add the soft butter, sweetener, and lemon zest. Beat with an electric mixer until lighter in color and creamy, about 30 seconds on medium speed.
- Add eggs one at a time. Keep beating at medium speed while you add the eggs. You should obtain a liquid yellowish batter after adding the 3 eggs, and it takes about 45 seconds to beat in the 3 large eggs.
- Stop the beater, add lemon juice, vanilla, almond flour, coconut flour, baking powder, and almond milk.
- Beat again on low speed to combine all the ingredients and form a consistent batter. It should be thick and fluffy.
- Using a spatula, stir in the blueberries (fresh or frozen).
- Use a mechanical ice cream scoop to transfer the batter from the bowl to the 12 holes muffin pan.
- Fill each cupcake hole evenly with the batter until no more left in the bowl.
- Bake for 25-35 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the center of the cupcakes comes out clean.
- Cool cupcakes on a rack for at least 3 hours before adding the buttercream frosting.
- I recommend you bring the cupcakes to the freezer for 10 minutes before frosting them. It will firm up the cupcakes and cool the top to make the frosting hold perfectly.
Keto lemon buttercream frosting
- In a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, add soft butter and beat on high speed until it forms a pale, smooth, and fluffy butter. If you don't have a stand mixer, use an electric beater.
- Reduce to low speed and add the lemon stevia drops. Then, gradually add the sugar-free powdered sweetener, half a cup at a time. When all the sugar-free sweetener has been added, mix on medium speed for 2 minutes until it forms a fluffy cream.
- Add unsweetened almond milk and keep whisking for 1 minute to incorporate.
- Pip the buttercream on top of each cupcake. Make sure the cupcakes are at room temperature.
- Decorate with lemon zest, a fresh blueberry on top, and some unsweetened desiccated coconut.
- Place the cupcakes in the fridge for 2 hours to set the frosting.
Storage
- Store the cupcakes in the fridge in an airtight cake box for 3 days.
- You can freeze cupcakes without frosting on top. Freeze the frosting separately in a bag. Defrost the day before. Cupcakes can be defrosted at room temperature but place the frozen frosting in the fridge. Decorate cupcakes before serving.
Tools
Getting Started What Is Keto? Macro Calculator Sweetener Converter Meal Plans Recipe Ebooks Intermittent Fasting Keto Fruits Keto Vegetables Keto Flours Fighting Keto Flu Healthy SweetenersWant My Kitchen Equipment?
About The Author
Hi, I'm Carine, the food blogger, author, recipe developer, published author of a cookbook and many ebooks, and founder of Sweet As Honey.
I have an Accredited Certificate in Nutrition and Wellness obtained in 2014 from Well College Global (formerly Cadence Health). I'm passionate about sharing all my easy and tasty recipes that are both delicious and healthy. My expertise in the field comes from my background in chemistry and years of following a keto low-carb diet. But I'm also well versed in vegetarian and vegan cooking since my husband is vegan.
I now eat a more balanced diet where I alternate between keto and a Mediterranean Diet
Cooking and Baking is my true passion. In fact, I only share a small portion of my recipes on Sweet As Honey. Most of them are eaten by my husband and my two kids before I have time to take any pictures!
All my recipes are at least triple tested to make sure they work and I take pride in keeping them as accurate as possible.
Browse all my recipes with my Recipe Index.
I hope that you too find the recipes you love on Sweet As Honey!
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Disclaimer
The recipes, instructions, and articles on this website should not be taken or used as medical advice. You must consult with your doctor before starting on a keto or low-carb diet. The nutritional data provided on Sweetashoney is to be used as indicative only.
The nutrition data is calculated using WP Recipe Maker. Net Carbs is calculated by removing the fiber and some sweeteners from the total Carbohydrates. As an example, a recipe with 10 grams of Carbs per 100 grams that contains 3 grams of erythritol and 5 grams of fiber will have a net carbs content of 2 grams. Some sweeteners are excluded because they are not metabolized.
You should always calculate the nutritional data yourself instead of relying on Sweetashoney's data. Sweetashoney and its recipes and articles are not intended to cure, prevent, diagnose, or treat any disease. Sweetashoney cannot be liable for adverse reactions or any other outcome resulting from the use of recipes or advice found on the Website.
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Thanks
Not worried about keto, but for pre-diabetic person watching sugar, allergic to nuts, we want to make cupcakes for birthday- do you think using oat flour and oat milk would work in place of almond in this recipe? It would still be more diabetic-friendly than regular flour. We could use cow’s milk (preferably skim, or low fat rather than regular, but not mandatory since there is not much of it- but might not be using lemon juice, so might need to make up for that, too). Thank you for any help. She is always getting left out on sweet things. 🙁
I didn’t try replacing almond flour with oat flour yet. Try my keto coconut flour cake it’s a great nut-free diabetic cake for celebration and so easy to make.
Hi, the these tasted lovely, but they were very heavy and dense in texture – nothing like a traditional cupcakes. This was my first attempt at keto cupcakes so I’m not sure if I did something wrong or if this is just how keto cakes are.
The batter also seemed very dry, not at all smooth, so I added another 30ml of almond milk, but it didn’t make a lot of difference, it was more like a sticky dough than a soft cake batter. They didn’t rise or spread in the oven and the little ‘spikes’ of batter cooked a lot quicker so I ended up with over cooked bits that i had to pick off.
Any help would be much appreciated!!
Well, keto baking is very different to wheat based baked goods and the batter is in fact, always much more dense and thick. But it doesn’t mean the result should be dry or gritty. The key is too use ultra fine almond flour in keto recipes calling for almond flour and not almond meal or coarse almond flour. I hope it helps. Read more keto baking tips on my article here. Enjoy!
Can I leave the blueberries out (just wanted to make lemon cupcake)? If so, do I need to add extra liquid to replace of the blueberries? How much? Thanks
Yes sure no need to add extra liquid if you skip blueberries
Sorry, ignore my first question (silly me, of course it’s a cupcake recipe)but pls help me with the other questions, thanks so much!
Hi there! I am about to make this recipe and just realized I only have 2 eggs. Can I add a little more milk or something else instead, or would that mess up the cupcakes?
Please help 😄
You need the amount of eggs stated in the recipe or the batter won’t hold with more liquid.
Can you use lemon extract in place of lemon stevia drops?
Sure
Can I use frozen strawberries?
If you add large frozen berries like strawberries in the batter the cupcakes will be very moist. I recommend chopping the strawberries in tiny pieces and eventually thaw and discard juice before adding. Otherwise use my keto strawberry muffin recipe.
Great treat for my Birthday!
Hi! What are the calories for a cupcake without the frosting?
The full nutrition panel appears after the recipe instructions, scroll up! enjoy
Are these calories including the buttercream and blueberries? I just made the cake part without blueberries/buttercream
Yes it includes all, if you didn’t add some ingredients you must use an app to recalculate your macros per serve
Could I replace the eggs with chia or flax eggs?
No sorry, the recipe won’t work batter won’t hold together.
Do you think I could sub coconut sugar for the Erythritol powder same amount and it would be ok?
Sure, it won’t be keto approved but it will work! Enjoy the cookies, XOXO Carine
Hi Carine! I Had been having troubles with the mesures of the ingredientes, since I don’t have a measuring cup, I converted the measurement to grams and milliliters, but my mixture is not the same texture at yours, it more thick, can you help me with the measurements in grams and milliliters plis! May be I converted wrong and I’m adding more flour than I should.
There is a ‘metric’ button before the ingredient list to convert my recipes in grams. This is what I recommend you to use to avoid converting everything on your side and result in a batter that could be too thick or thin. Enjoy, XOXO Carine
OMG! I didn’t see it, tanks so much 🥰
I have another question, if I don’t what the lemon test should I replace the 60 ml of lemon juice for 60 ml of milk or just skip the ml of lemon juice ?
Great ! I am glad you can see it, this is very useful if you are baking in grams/ml! So yes keep the same amount of liquid or the cupcake will be dry but use milk of your choice, I would recommend unsweetened keto vanilla almond milk for vanilla cupcakes! enjoy, XOXO Carine
Can you use swerve in stead erythritol or xylitol? I’ve never used either of those so don’t know how they impact recipe.
Sure, use the same amount and taste will be identical. Enjoy! Xoxo Carine
Hello! I made these today. Actually my first time ever making anything Keto. Is it supposed to have that grainy texture? Is that how keto cakes are? And also why must the cakes cool for 3 hours? Does cooling them longer change the texture or quality?
Thank you!
Hello and welcome to keto baking ! So keto baking is different to what you used to eat before, it shouldn’t be grainy if you use ultra fine almond flour. Some almond flour are coarse like almond meal and provide a gritty texture to keto baked goods. I recommend you use uLtra fine almond flour next time (see this brand, affiliate link), you will see a big difference. Also, the waiting time like in any other baking recipe, give time to the moisture to evaporate and texture to set. So yes, this impact the texture and flavor of your baked recipe. If you don’t wait, it will be good but it can be fragile and ultra moist.
Trying this recipe today. Can I substitute coconut or macadamia nut for almond milk? Also, for the batter and frosting, is it salted or unsalted butter? Thanks!
Yes any nut milk will provide the same texture. The frosting use unsalted butter. Enjoy the recipes on the blog, XOXO Carine
I didn’t have lemon stevia for the frosting and used vanilla stevia and a squirt of lemon instead. I halved the amount of sweetener (I used Swerve confectioners) and added lavender. They were next level! 9 year old said best cupcakes ever. Slight issue that they broke apart a little, but texture and moisture was just right otherwise.
Sounds so goun with the lavender and vanilla. Thanks for sharing with me your tips. Enjoy the recipes on the blog, XOXO Carine.
I put this recipe together, popped the cupcakes in the oven and realized it didn’t say where to add the almond milk, oh no! I quickly took the cupcakes out of the oven but now that I have the blueberries in the batter, I’m not sure what, if anything, I can do to to save this recipe (and all these ingredients) :'( Any suggestions?
I am not sure why you can’t see almond milk in the recipe, it is there on my side. However, don’t worry too much if the batter is not cooked yet return all the batter in the bowl and combine the almond milk, at room temperature in the batter. Then bake as usual. Also, I am sure the recipe will bake well without the almond milk as the recipe calls for a very small amount. The cupcake will simply be less fluffy but good! Enjoy, XOXO Carine
lemons and blueberries! Love!
best combo of flavor I agree!