Triple-Lemon Drizzle Birthday Cake

This whole 'I'll be a better blogger' thing has just not happened. Not being in my own kitchen whenever I want to be ("you can think again if you are about to bake" has been screamed at me a few times and I've only been back ten days.) and having to work along side other people really isn't working out for me. I really am doing the best I can with the little space I have!

I am pretty busy being a total misery guts about not being in Liverpool with my other half at the moment, but I did find time for a little smile on my mum's birthday when I presented her with her cake. I started a 'what's your favourite cake' conversation a few days prior to the big day (my detective skills are second to none) with my mum and dad on the pretense that I had no baking blog ideas (ha!), to discover my lemon drizzle cake came out on top. Both my Nanna and Grandma are excellent bakers and they both speak very embarrassingly highly of my lemon drizzle cake so this really is a cake I am proud of. Many lemon drizzle cakes I have tried (both shop bought and homemade) have been a little dry and somewhat lacking in that good old lemon flavour one looks for in a lemon drizzle cake, but this recipe really is the bee's knees as far as lemon drizzle is concerned.

I have been using this lemon drizzle recipe since I made my first one about ten years ago. When I was 10. So needless to say I have no idea where the recipe originally came from. Like genuinely not a clue, all I have is a little piece of paper with it scrawled out. (The photo below is a re-write, not the tatty one I keep safe wedged between the 800 pages of a monstrous veggie cookbook.)

I have never iced a lemon drizzle cake before but since birthday celebrations were involved I thought I'd spruce things up a bit with a lemon buttercream. The cake is tantalizingly zesty and super moist so this sweet addition balances things out nicely.

 

ALSO a little bit of excitement for you... I MADE MY FIRST GIF! It's pretty crappy, but considering I had NO idea what I was doing I don't think it's half bad ;) If anyone knows how to do it so I don't have the stutter in the loop between the repeats please let me know!

Eeeeesh it is pretty poor isn't it. Never mind, one can only improve!
Umm embarrassing realization - my GIF is BACKWARDS HAHAHA. Blummin' heck it is even worse than I thought.

Ingredients

For the lemon drizzle cake

175 g unsalted butter, softened

250 g granulated sugar

2 lemons (zest for the cake, juice minus 2 tbsp for the drizzle)

3 medium eggs

250 g self raising flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

115 ml milk (I always use semi-skimmed)

100 g caster sugar, for the drizzle

For the lemon buttercream

120 g unsalted butter, softened

300 g icing sugar (powdered sugar)

zest of 1 lemon

2 tsp of lemon juice (from the drizzle lemon juice)

Directions

1. Pre heat the oven to 180 degrees C and line a cake tin. I used a deep (4 in) cake tin with a 6 in diameter.

2. Cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

3. Zest the two lemons straight into the butter and sugar and mix in well. Beat in the two eggs.

4. Sift in the self raising flour and baking powder and mix gently just to incorporate a little. Add the milk and mix the batter thoroughly, only until you can no longer see any streaks of flour. Bake the cake for one hour, until a cocktail stick comes out clean, checking from 50 minutes. If you are baking your cake in a wider, more shallow pan then check from about 45 minutes as it will not take an hour!

5. To make the drizzle, juice two lemons and add this to 100 g of caster sugar a few tbsp at a time to avoid having too runny a drizzle. I used about 1.5 lemons but obviously it depends on the size of your lemons, mine were pretty large! The drizzle should be the consistency of a thin syrup. Make sure you save 2 tbsp or so for the lemon buttercream as there is absolutely no point in juicing a third lemon - waste not, want not!

6. Before you remove the cake from its pan to cool, add the drizzle. Using a skewer or a knitting needle (or something similar), poke a hole in the cake, inserting the skewer to about 1/2 an inch from the bottom of the cake. Wiggle the skewer around a bit to create a bigger hole then pour the drizzle down the hole, using the skewer to guide it, just until it overflows slightly. Repeat this all over the top of the cake until you run out of drizzle (or patience, whichever comes first).

7. Leave for about ten minutes before removing the cake from its tin to a wire rack to cool fully.

8. To make the lemon buttercream, cream together the icing sugar and butter until it reaches a smooth consistency. Zest the lemon straight in and mix to incorporate. If the mix is 'too dry' add the lemon juice you saved a tsp at a time, being careful not to overdo it.

9. Only when the cake is cool should you apply the buttercream. Using a palette knife, spread the buttercream liberally onto the cake. I did a very thin crumb coat first - always a good idea!

10. Add candles as appropriate!

11. Serve, share, eat and ENJOY :D My mum certainly did! Happy birthday ma!