lemon cake

dear readers, i have much to share with you, but i’ve been spending time doing the happy stuff instead of documenting the happy stuff, but i still like to have a record of the highlights and, of course, i love getting comments from all of you, so some serious catching-up is in order.  i finally downloaded a bunch of photos off of my cameras tonight, so that’s one big step done.  but enough whining, let’s talk about lemon cake!

awhile back, i tried to read through molly wizenberg’s memoir/cookbook and quickly realized i didn’t have time to read and enjoy it properly.  until i hit upon the brilliant idea of listening to a recording of it.  i mean, i love foodie writing, i love hearing stories of people’s lives–it was excellent driving entertainment.  and at the end of each chapter i was convinced that i needed to try the recipe she’d just talked about (a dangerous side-effect of a good food blogger!), but the recipes weren’t included on the “unabridged” recording!  not that i have any interest in trying to follow a recipe aurally anyway.  so i checked out a paper copy of the book and flipped through it, marking the recipes that had particularly caught my attention.  this recipe for a “french style yogurt cake with lemon” was pretty much at the top of the stack, so when i found myself with an occasion that called for cake last sunday, i jumped on the chance to try this recipe.  one of the things i love about it is that there are no weird ingredients (other than, perhaps whole milk plain yogurt, but with a baby in the house, we almost have that on hand these days) that i don’t just stock in the fridge.  it’s really a pretty simple cake.  the most onerous part is zesting and juicing the lemons (not really that big of a deal).  i doubled the recipe and made two since i was feeding a crowd and i used white whole wheat flour instead of all-purpose flour because that’s what’s in my cupboard right now.  every piece disappeared.  i heard lots of positive comments floating around the crowd and the pieces that i’d managed to eat before i put it out were quite tasty.

the recipe in the book varies slightly in that it calls for a second glazing and i think that’s really key.  the cake itself is a bit of a blank slate, but the addition of a lemon/sugar syrup and a lemon/sugar glaze on top of that makes for the perfect lemony zing that’s not too sweet, but makes your mouth taste like sunshine.  i don’t think i’ve ever been disappointed with one of her recipes.  maybe i’ll have to try another one from the book soon….