Lemon Cream Cake

This lemon cream cake was a surprise, a very good one. And that is not counting the limoncello glaze, which is amazing.

I bake. A lot. A lot of cakes. And a lot of lemon cakes, loaf or otherwise.

Truth is, few recipes surprise me in terms of not being sure how they will turn out. But this one did. And in the best possible way.

I was intrigued upon reading this recipe for the first time. I imagined a standard loaf or pound cake and this was not the usual way to make it.

This is a strange recipe. The book talks about it being similar to a genoise, but I don't agree.

For me, genoise has, mainly, eggs beaten to triple their volume. And that is specifically discouraged here. The eggs and sugar simply have to be whisked until foamy. So it came down to mixing, not beating, one ingredient after the other. Like you would a one bowl cake made with oil or the filling for lemon bars. Just add and mix. And then there's cream and melted butter added at the end, with a spatula. Why change to a spatula is beyond me. Another item to wash when I could easily have continued with my little whisk and achieved the same batter.

But this, I read somewhere, is a thing of pro bakers that are used to using many bowls and whisks. They don't have to clean up the mess (I said that last part).

Frankly, I had my doubts it would even rise in the oven. I repeat, it was strange. It was moist, but with an extremely tight crumb. I had expected that, but not for it to rise so much. My experience with cream in batters is that it weighs them down. Well, this one proved me wrong.

I made this for a friend and kept it wrapped for one day. I glazed it with a combination of powdered sugar and limoncello. I'm getting a bit addicted to glazes of powdered sugar and liqueurs.

As far as lemons cakes go, I like mine very lemony. This needed about double the amount of zest that was called for in the recipe. So I changed that the next time I baked it. Which were a few.

In the end, I liked the texture and taste very much, but it doesn't get many points as a plain lemon cake.

But this is a cake I would definitely bake if I wanted to make a trifle from scratch. Or serve a thick slice (I cannot begin to tell you how I hate thin slices of pound cake) alongside fresh fruit with honey and whipped cream. Something like that.

Lemon Cream loaf Cake

★★★★★ 5 from 2 reviews

• Yield: 8 servings 1x

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Ingredients

• 4 eggs (room tº)
• 1 ⅓ cups 265g sugar
• Pinch of salt
• Zest of 3 or 4 lemons
• A few drops vanilla extract
• 1 ¾ cups 245g all purpose flour
• ½ teaspoon baking powder
• ½ cup 125ml cream, room tº
• 5 ½ Tbs 80g butter, melted

For the glaze:

• ½ cup powdered sugar
• 2-3 teaspoons limoncello

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Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350ºF / 180ºC.
2. Line bottom of a 4x10 inch loaf pan with parchment paper and spray or butter the unlined sides.
3. In a large bowl beat eggs, sugar and salt for a minute. It only needs to become frothy.
4. Add zest and vanilla and mix.
5. In 3 parts add sifted flour and baking powder (I sift it directly over the batter). Mix well, we don’t want lumps.
6. Add cream and mix.
7. Add melted butter, mix well and fill the pan.
8. Bake for 45-50 minutes, until golden and a tester comes out clean.
9. Let cool completely on wire rack.

For the glaze:

1. Mix powdered sugar and limoncello (or lemon juice/milk/water if you don’t want booze) until creamy and smooth.
2. You can make it more or less thick according to your taste.
3. Glaze cool cake. Store wrapped at room tº.

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Paula Montenegro

I'm Paula, a baker for more than 30 years and your designated recipe finder, sharing the best ones on this blog, with simple ingredients + easy-to-follow instructions.