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This Lemon & Thyme Pound Cake is simple and sophisticated. It's lightly flavored, moist, and light. You'll fall in love with this dreamy cake. I know I did.
It's Valentine's Day, and I hope it's filled with hearts and flowers. If nobody's buying you chocolates, then go get them for yourself. Chocolates that you don't have to share are the best kind of chocolates. I've actually been known to ration chocolates at my house. My husband thinks it's okay to eat them all in two days instead of making them last. He's insane. He's also the love of my life.
I've been looking forward to my cheeseburger and milkshake all week, so I can't wait to share an incredible date night with that crazy man. I am so immensely lucky to have someone in my life who totally gets me. If I had met him in my 20's, I probably wouldn't have spent so much time hating myself. He makes me a better person. He deserves all the cake.
Since I shared all the chocolate with you in my last post, I'm going for something a little more subtle here. I have absolutely no objection to an over the top chocolate dessert, but sometimes quiet sophistication is the way to go. I mean, if you have to keep telling people you're a very stable genius, you're probably not. This cake is not screaming your greatness. It's just sitting there being beautiful. You know you want some.
This Lemon & Thyme Pound Cake has a subtle flavor of citrus and herb. The thyme is not weird at all. The glaze has more of a lemon punch, but we're not swimming in it. It's light and moist with a slightly crunchy crust. Everybody who has tried this cake has really loved it. Plus, just look at how pretty it is.
As always, this cake is really simple to make. We use a typical creaming method, adding in the lemon zest with the butter and the thyme with the sugar to get the most flavor impact. Make sure you spray your bundt pan really well with non-stick spray. Also, be sure to use a skewer to check it's baked all the way through. You want the cake to release easily. And if you can get someone to help you strip your thyme leaves while you get to work on measuring and mixing your other ingredients, it will save you a lot of time.
Happy Valentine's Day, friends. Take a moment to tell someone you love them. And maybe remind yourself as well. And share some Lemon & Thyme Pound Cake with them, while you're at it. It's gonna be awesome.
Lemon & Thyme Pound Cake
Course: DessertDifficulty: Easy10
servings30
minutes50
minutesIngredients
450 grams plain or all-purpose flour
¾ teaspoon baking powder
¾ teaspoon baking soda or bicarb
½ teaspoon salt
200 grams unsalted butter, softened
2 lemons
4 tablespoons fresh thyme leaves, plus more for decorating
250 grams caster or superfine sugar
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
250 ml buttermilk
120 grams icing or powdered sugar
Directions
- Preheat your oven to 170 C (350 F) and place a baking sheet in the oven while it heats up. Grease your bundt pan thoroughly. The easiest way to do this is with a non-stick baking spray, but you could also butter and flour it. Just get all the crevices.
- Combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a mixing bowl. Set aside.
- Add your butter to a large mixing bowl and zest both your lemons directly over the butter so that any of the lemon oil released falls into the bowl. Beat the butter with an electric mixer for a few minutes until it's creamy.
- Next, add your sugar and your four tablespoons of fresh thyme leaves to the butter, and beat for 3-5 minutes until your mixture is fluffy and pale.
- Add your eggs to the bowl one at a time, beating to combine after each egg. Then add in the vanilla and beat to combine.
- Now with your mixer on its lowest setting, alternate a third of the dry ingredients with a third of the buttermilk, just bringing everything together before adding more dry ingredients and buttermilk until everything is in. Finally, beat in the juice of one lemon.
- Using a rubber spatula, give your bowl a good scrape and give it a few mixes to make sure everything is well combined before carefully transferring your mixture to your greased bundt pan. Try to spread it as evenly as you can, making sure there aren't any air pockets. Avoid leaving any stray batter on the side of the pan if possible.
- Bake your cake for about an hour before you start checking it to see if it's baked. It may take up to an hour and 15 minutes. My oven is really hot on the top, so I baked mine for 40 minutes, then slid another baking sheet ofer the rack above to keep the top (which will become the bottom) from getting to brown, Then I baked it for another 20 minutes. Try to get a skewer that will go all the way to the center of the cake for testing. When the tester comes out clean, your cake is ready to take out of the oven. If it's underbaked, it can crack when you take it out of the pan.
- Allow the cake to cool in the pan for 15 minutes before carefully turning it out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
- To make the glaze, add your powdered sugar to a mixing bowl and squeez in the juice of half a lemon. Whisk this together until smooth. You can add more lemon juice from the second half of the lemon a little bit at a time until you get the consistency you like. I make mine a bit on the thick side. When the cake is completely cooled, simply drizzle the glaze over the cake. Decorate your cake with sprigs of fresh thyme if you like.
Recipe adapted from Simply Nigella by Nigella Lawson.
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