Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Meyer Lemon Curd Cake

This is not the prettiest cake, I know this. BUT trust me when I say, it is totally and completely worth making. The cake batter part is rich and vanilla-y, which goes really well with the lemon curd. And when baked, the lemon curd gets a lemon bar type consistency. SO good. I'm pretty sure I ate most of it myself. My family aren't huge lemon fans so whenever I end up making lemon things, I eat the majority of it myself (over a period of time of course). I have been known to eat an entire (large) pan of lemon bars by myself in two days... yeah, not a good life choice...
But this cake is one that I definitely do not mind eating all by myself, it's just that delicious. Also, it's totally easy to put together. It'd be delicious with other kinds of curd too of course. I'd like to try it with raspberry curd next.
So while this cake may not be the one you pull out to show off when guests come over, it is definitely a good cake to make for a night in, or a lazy weekend breakfast. Trust me, totally worth making. Don't judge a book by it's cover and all that jazz. Also, it's from Heidi at 101 Cookbooks and I'm pretty sure she's incapable of creating something that isn't totally delicious.
You can use store-bought lemon curd, but it's probably cheaper and way more fun/delicious to make it yourself. It may seem like a scary thing to make, but trust me, it's totally easy!

Lemon Curd Cake
Adapted from 101 Cookbooks
1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup lemon curd
Sugar in the raw for the top (optional but definitely adds a good texture and flavor)

Preheat oven to 350, butter a 9" pan. Set aside
Whisk together flour, baking powder and salt in a small bowl and set aside.
In the bowl of a mixer, cream together butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Add in eggs one at a time, then beat in vanilla.
Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients all at once and fold in to combine. Do not over-mix.
Pour half the batter into the pan, and using about half of the curd, drop spoonfuls over the batter. Pour the rest of the batter in. It's a thick batter so it's not going to smooth over the curd well, that's okay though. Do your best to get it over, then put the remaining curd on top of the batter. Take a butter knife and swirl the curd and batter just slightly, being careful not to get the curd too close to the sides of the pan (it will stick and be pretty messy after baking). Sprinkle sugar in the raw on top. Bake 32-34 minutes.

3 comments:

  1. Hey Ryan! I noticed your comment on Kelsey's Apple a Day blog (her potato soup post - I'm hosting the Souper Bowl she dedicated her post to). I live in SC, too, so I definitely know how you feel about not having soup weather. I also wanted to stop by and say 'hey' because I'm a fellow horse lover (I've got two of 'em walking around my yard outside at the moment). You can check out my horse blog (www.fromheytohorses.wordpress.com) if you want - I always love to keep in contact with horse people!

    ReplyDelete
  2. That cake does look totally worth making! I love lemon curd and I'm trying to get my hands on more meyer lemons as they're not easy to come by here!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Sometimes the food that doesn't look the best tastes the best! Weird how that works out.

    ReplyDelete