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Monday, September 27, 2010

HCB: Golden Lemon Almond Cake



As I do not feel like making the Chocolate Tomato Soup cake for this week's HCB selection, I decided to play catch up and make something else from the book.

The lucky cake of the week is the Golden Lemon Almond Cake.

As a habit of making 1/2 a recipe, I thought of taking Rose's alternative suggestion - making 2/3 of the recipe and baking it in a loaf pan.

Of course as I am so used to halving recipes, I started well by toasting 2/3 of the almonds, and measuring 2/3 of the sugar, but then proceeded to measure 1/2 recipe of the flour and leavening, and then mixing all of them together. Okay, so I am not that adventurous that I want to try to bake the concoction - not to mention that it will be awfully sweet - so I threw away everything and started over. If I am a math whiz I can probably figure out what's missing and backtrack but math is pretty low on my list of skill sets :).


Anyway, so first things first, toast almonds! Then grind with some of the sugar until they say "MERCY!" Mix it with the flour, remaining sugar, leavening, and a lot of lemon zest. I used a little bit more than the recipe requires. In a separate bowl, eggs are whisked with a bit of sour cream, lemon oil, and vanilla. Then added in the remaining sour cream and butter to the flour mixture, mix and mix until they are incorporated. Lastly, added in the egg mixture in two additions. Mix, mix, and mix. Well okay, the KA is the one doing all the mixing, I was just standing there and timing the procedures :).

While the cake is baking, I made the syrup. Combined lemon juice and sugar over medium heat until the sugar dissolved. I am happy this recipe calls for turbinado sugar, it gives me a chance to use up my supply.

The cake looks awfully plain in it's loaf pan shape, so I whipped up some dreamy creamy white chocolate frosting and piped roses and rose buds all over. I made 2/3 of the recipe and still had a lot left, so I piped some cute words and presented the cake to hubby - who said "AWWW" at the writing, before he proceeded to chow down a little piece and gave his thumbs up :).






Tasting impressions:
It is so good. Very lemony and moist. It reminds me of a pound cake - a REALLY good one. The frosting adds a nice chocolate sweetness to it. This will definitely get made again and again!

7 comments:

  1. ahhh cute Jenn... you are a romantic - aha!

    This one is on my list for a Free choice, but I may crumble and make it whenever I feel like it.

    This week I'm recuperating! Plus, my mom's birthday is around the corner and I just decided to throw a dinner party.

    Can you scream MENU PLANNING?

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  2. soo preety! Love the pipe roses! i can't remember seeing this recipe in the book..now i have to go check it out! :D

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  3. This looks so delicious. Definitely on my catch up list!

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  4. I love the roses, and the cake sounds delicious! Did you have to make any modifications to the white chocolate frosting recipe to get it to rose piping consistency?

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  5. Andrea, no modifications at all to the frosting. I did have to re-chill the frosting halfway through piping as they get too soft.

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  6. lovely loaf cake! i liked how you dressed it up with the piping.

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  7. Oh my god! This is the most beautiful cake I've seen in ages. I seriously love love love it!!! And the cake itself, judging on my experience of lemon plus almonds, would be delicious. Ps. Good idea halving recipes. I need portion control :|

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