Italian Lemon Cake

We got home an Italian Lemon Tree planted in a pot last month. Its a small baby with 6 green lemons on the plant. Since then I have been watering that l'il baby every single day waiting for the lemons to turn yellow. I wanted to try so many citrus recipes with these home grown lemons. But more than a month passed and still the lemons didn't turned yellow; the waiting part is so difficult. Until one day when I a lemon turned slightly yellow. That's when I got my first Italian lemon to use for my baking experiments.

It was a very tough to decide on one recipe to make with my very first Italian lemon. I was tempted to try among so many citrus recipes with that one lemon but I kinda decided to make a lemon cake as I had made it at various several occasion and it's been a hit every single time I have made it but somehow never got a chance to feature it on the blog here because I didn't have any pictures of those cakes I had made earlier. 
And being such a expensive Italian lemon tree, I didn't want to take too many chances with it.

I got this Ina Garten's recipe of Lemon Cake from food network and kind of got intrigued to see that the cake gets its lemon flavour from the lemon zest while the lemon syrup is used to infuse the cake with some lemony flavour topped with a lemon glaze. Hence, this cake gets loaded with triple the lemony tangyness and the citrus flavour oozes out on every single bite of this cake very beautifully. The cake was so fresh and the tartness of lemon was just enough to kick all the right flavours in the mouth which lingers for a long time. 

The cake gets a very nice crust from the outside and perfect moistness from the yogurt. This cake is simply perfect for any time of the day.

Lets take you to the recipe

(Print this recipe)

Italian lemon Cake


Preparation Time: 10 minutes
Baking Time: 50 minutes

Source: www.foodnetwork.com
Makes one 9x5 loaf cake

Here's what you would need to make Lemon Cake:

Lemon Cake:

1 1/2 cups/ (175 gms) all purpose flour, sifted

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt 

1 cup/ (240 ml) yogurt

1 1/3 cup/ (200 gms + 65 gms) caster sugar, divided

3 large eggs, at room temperature

2 tsp lemon zest (from 1 large Italian lemon/ 3 small lemons)

1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract

1/2 cup/ (120 ml) vegetable oil

1/3 cup/ (80 ml) lemon juice

Glaze:

1 cup (115 gms) icing or confectioner's sugar

2 tbsp lemon juice

Here's how you can make it:

Preheat your oven to 180 degree C/ 350 degree F. Grease a 9X5X2 inch loaf pan with butter and dust with flour to form a coating.

• In a bowl, sift all purpose flour, baking powder and salt and whisk it all together to until all dry ingredients come together.
• In another bowl add 1 cup sugar and curd and whisk it until nicely combined.
• Add all the three eggs and vanilla extract to the sugar yogurt mixture and whisk it until all the ingredients combine together.
• Add the dry ingredients to the mixture and combine in the batter using a rubber spatula.
• Add the lemon zest and give it a good stir.
• Add vegetable oil and mix it well.
• Pour the batter in the prepared loaf tin and bake for about 50 minutes or until a tooth pick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean.
• While the cake is baking in the oven, combine lemon juice with 1/3 cup of remaining sugar in a heatproof container and heat it over medium flame until the sugar is dissolved and makes a lemony simple syrup. Once the sugar is dissolved, turn the heat off and let the syrup cool to room temperature.
• Once the cake is baked, let the cake cool in the loaf pan kept over a cooling rack for 10 minutes before taking the loaf from pan. Let the loaf cool on the wire rack kept over a baking tray. 
• Once the loaf is warm enough to handle with hands, poke holes on the top layer of the loaf using tooth pick and pour the lemon syrup over the cake. Let the lemon syrup get soaked into the loaf before glazing the top layer with the lemon glaze.

Glaze:

• Sift the icing sugar and add lemon juice and stir it until smooth.
• Pour the glaze on the cake before serving.

Hope you would also enjoy enjoy making this as much as I did!

Happy Baking!

Rum and Raisin Brownies

I was thinking its been a really long time I have not tried a chocolate recipe as I was using more of fruits and other stuff in my baking. I have tried a lot of recipes of which I have posted the pictures on my FB page but somehow couldn't post the recipe here on the blog. Something or the other just kept me away from writing the recipe and posting it on the blog lately. I promise all of these would get archived on the blog by end of next week. I am keeping my fingers crossed.

The day has been very packed for me as I was in the kitchen all day baking some homemade granola muffins to participate in a healthy cooking competition at the Golds Gym being hosted. I was excited about my first ever participation in any cookery competition. I didn't win, but enjoyed just being a part of it.

Once I came back from the competition, Mr. SD was waiting for me to go to the Volkswagen showroom to test drive the new car he finalised for us. By the time we came back from home, it was already 7 in the evening and I was completely exhausted. And that's when Mr. SD tells me that we would be leaving in precisely an hour for his friend's birthday dinner and wondered if I can make "something" for the birthday boy.
I was awestruck!

I realised cake was not an option considering the amount of time I had. I thought of something boozy as it was going to be an all adults dinner and something chocolate as that is the choice of anybody for a birthday no matter what the age. Hence, I thought of Rum and Raisin Brownies as it takes no time to whip up everything and much less time to bake and once baked you are done. I was good to go...Exactly what I wanted at the occasion.

And for this, I completely involved Mr. SD to whip things up. (Yes, he is very supportive of me...Lucky me!!!) I started off by melting butter, chocolate and brown sugar in the microwave...less than a couple of minutes. While Mr. SD was breaking the eggs and whisking them up with some caster sugar I added the melted chocolate butter mixture while continuing to whisk the eggs. I then got the bottle of rum and measured it to half a cup while Mr. SD was staring at the quantity of rum I was adding to the mixture. I know, it was in excess, but that's exactly what was required to make these brownies decadent and full of flavour!

These brownies were packed with the flavours and all the main ingredients i.e. chocolate, rum and raisins mingled so well with each other giving it a great dark dense taste and a gooey fudgy texture. I made 24 brownies and took half of them over to the dinner of 7 and was surprised to see that everybody took 2 helpings of the brownies and all of it was over even before we finished the dinner.

Such a success!!! Yayyy!!!

Lets get you the recipe of these decadent brownies so that you can also make and savour some boozy goodness with your dear friends this upcoming festive season..:)

(Print this recipe)

Rum and Raisin Brownies

Preparation Time: 10 minutes   

Baking Time: 25 minutes


Makes: one pan of 9' X 13' or
24 brownies 

Adapted minimally from: www.mabletan.com



Here's what you would need to make Rum and Raisin Brownies:

300 gms dark chocolate, chopped

200 gms unsalted butter

110 gms/ ½ cup brown sugar

120 ml/ ½ cup rum (I used 40% alcohol content rum)

4 eggs

½ cup caster sugar

½ tsp salt (ignore the salt if using salted butter)

130 gms/ 1 cup all purpose flour, sifted

110 gms/ 1 cup raisins/ dried cranberries (I used a combination of both)

For frosting:

Cocoa powder to sprinkle on the brownies

Here's how you can make it:

Preheat your oven to 350 F /180 C. Line a 9X13 inch baking pan with some parchment paper hanging out on the sides so that you can pull out the brownies very easily once they are baked.

• In a bowl, add all purpose flour, salt and raisins or cranberries and whisk it to mix it all together. The reason we are adding raisins in the flour is to get raisins properly quoted in flour so that they don't sink in the bottom of the pan while baking.
• In a microwave or on a double boiler, add dark chocolate, butter and brown sugar and melt it until nice and smooth. Stir it continuously after every 20 seconds. 
• In another bowl, whisk all the eggs with caster sugar until eggs become pale in colour. Do not over mix the batter as we don't want a cakey brownies. Mix just until the ingredients are combined nicely.
• Add the chocolate mixture to the egg mixture while continuing to whisk the egg mixture.
• Add the rum to the chocolate mixture and whisk until combined. It will be a very runny mixture at this in time.
• Add the flour mixture and mix it well using a plastic spatula or a wooden spoon just until all the flour are combined in the wet ingredient and you don't see any flour in the mixture.
• Pour the batter into the prepared baking pan and bake for 20-25 minutes or until a tooth pick inserted in the center of the pan comes out clean or with few moist crumbs.
• Take the pan out of the oven and let it cool on the wire rack for 10 minutes before taking out from the pan.
• Once cooled enough, take the brownies out from the pan by lifting the parchment paper overhanging on the sides and transfer to the wire rack to cool.
• Cut the brownies and sprinkle them with some cocoa powder passed through a sieve. 

Note: we consumed these brownies when these were slightly warm and everybody loved it. You will like them even when cooled I bet.

Hope you would also enjoy making this recipe as much as I did.

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Happy Baking!