Lemon Drop Cake

Currently baking out of Baked by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito

For me, lemon cakes are either great or gross. There doesn’t seem to be much in between. Fortunately, this cake lands firmly on the great side. In fact, this might just be my favorite recipe out of Baked.

The cake part of this creation is a white cake flavored with lemon zest. I cut the recipe by 1/3 (because I only have two cake pans and the original recipe calls for three 8-inch pans) and toned down the leavening. I had no problems with the cake rising and then falling or being underbaked. My only concern was the tunneling that occurred in the cake (if you look closely at the slice of cake, you can see the holes in the cake). I might have over beaten the batter, but even then, the cake was light and moist with a really nice lemon flavor.

As the cakes were baking and cooling, I made the lemon curd part of the recipe. This is a standard lemon curd, lots of egg yolks, lemon juice and butter. Some lemon curds can taste really eggy, but not this one. It was the perfect balance between tart and sweet.

The last component of the cake was the frosting. Instead of calling for a standard buttercream, you cook a mixture of flour, sugar, milk and cream on the stovetop until it boils and thickens. This mixture is then whipped until cool at which point alot of butter is added. After more whipping, you end up with a light, satiny smooth buttercream. To make it lemony, some of the curd is stirred into the frosting. I’ve never made frosting like this, but I liked it. Alot.

To assemble the cake, you spread lemon curd between the cake layers and then frost the whole shebang. I had some concerns that the weight of the cake layers would force the curd out from the cake, but the curd was thick enough to stay put.

I’m already planning on making this cake again soon. I only ate a couple of pieces before I sent the rest to Bryan’s office. Now I’m thinking that was a mistake; I should have eaten the whole thing myself.