Sorry it’s been so quiet around here the past few days. Blogger ran into some issues which made it impossible for me to publish new posts. If you’ve tried to comment over the past 2 days and have run into any problems, I apologize – that was likely also a result of the Blogger outage. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that things will return to normal now and we can get back to the important stuff – the food 🙂
Back in early March, when I’d had just about all the snowy, cold winter weather I could take, I bought a giant bag of bright, cheery lemons and started baking. I shared these lemon bars soon after and within that post promised to tell you about a lemon cake I’d made recently as well. For whatever reason I never got around to writing that post and had completely forgotten about it until I discovered the photos in my Flickr account the other day. This isn’t the first time I’ve told that story about a recipe I made and it probably won’t be the last. One of these days I’ll learn the lesson about organization in all of this and find a few spare hours to do something about it. For now I’m just glad to finally tell you about this cake, which I absolutely loved.
If you’re a lemon lover, this cake won’t disappoint. It’s packed with more lemon flavor than any cake I’ve ever made and the texture is perfectly tender. Plus, it’s not very labor intensive; since it’s a bundt you don’t even have to frost it – you could simply eat it plain or dust it with a bit of powdered sugar. I like the way a glaze drips down the sides of a bundt so I almost always make one where it’s an option but this cake won’t suffer if you skip it. I halved the recipe below and baked my bundt in a 6-cup pan with no problem. I think I ate two slices within the first day after I made it and wound up calling a friend to see if I could share the rest with her since it was proving to be so difficult to resist!
It’s probably worth noting that Cook’s Illustrated called this a “light” recipe. That’s not why I made it and I wouldn’t have pegged it as a light dessert after tasting it, but it’s an added bonus. There’s still half a stick of butter and 1/4 cup of oil in this recipe but compared to the 2 1/4 sticks of butter in the standard lemon bundt on their site, it’s a definite improvement.
Lemon Bundt Cake
from Cook’s Illustrated
3 cups (12 oz) cake flour
2 cups (14 oz) sugar
1/4 cup lemon zest (from about 4 lemons)
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup whole milk, at room temperature
3 large eggs, yolks and whites separated
1/4 cup vegetable oil
4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
pinch cream of tartar
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice, from 1 lemon
Lemon Glaze
1 cup (4 oz) confectioners’ sugar
5 teaspoons juice from 1 lemon
1 tablespoon lemon zest (from about 1 lemon)
pinch salt
Preheat oven to 350 F with a rack in the lower third. Spray a 12-cup bundt pan with nonstick cooking spray with flour (or grease with butter and lightly coat with flour).
In a large bowl, combine 1 1/2 cups of the sugar and the zest. Rub the zest into the sugar with your fingertips until the sugar is moist and fragrant. Add the flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda to the bowl containing the sugar/zest mixture and whisk to combine everything. In a large measuring cup, whisk the milk, egg yolks, oil, butter and vanilla.
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat the egg whites on low speed until foamy. Add the cream of tartar then increase the speed to medium-high. With the mixer running, add the remaining 1/2 cup of sugar, a little at a time, and continue beating until the whites are shiny and form stiff peaks.
Add the milk mixture and lemon juice to the dry ingredients and whisk until smooth. Add one third of the egg whites to the bowl and stir to combine (to lighten the batter) then add the remaining egg whites and gently fold to incorporate (try not to deflate the whites).
Pour the batter into the prepared pan. Bake for about 40-45 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out with a few moist crumbs attached. Transfer the pan to a wire rack and cool for 10 minutes then turn the cake out onto the rack to cool completely.
To make the glaze: Whisk everything together in a medium bowl until smooth. Drizzle over the cake letting it run down the sides. Let the glaze set for about 15 minutes.
Absolutely gorgeous! I’m craving lemon cake now!!
I can never find a recipe with enough lemon in it to suit me. Maybe this is it. Thanks for posting.
As usual your pics are perfect!!
Sigh…this lemon lover wants a piece. And again, when are you going to go work for Cook’s Illustrated? 🙂
My family loves lemon cakes, this will be made ASAP!
Love this! I just bought a new bundt pan this week, even. Light, too? Awesome.
You just reminded me of all the lemon juice I have in my freezer…this looks like the perfect cake to use some of it up!
There’s another lemon bundt cake from America’s Test Kitchen that I’ve been meaning to try, but maybe I’ll make this one instead. (I’ve been stocking up on lemons.)
this looks delicious lovely drizzle on top of the cake
That’s a gorgeous bundt cake! I especially love the drizzle on top… the fact that it is a Lemon bundt just seals the deal! Thanks for sharing 🙂
This cake looks lovely! I’m so glad you found the photos! Mmm.
I am a lemon lover so I am looking forward to trying this. Lots of lemon and tender – sounds like a winner to me!
I don’t love lemon desserts but this bundt cake looks so incredibly perfect. I’m sure people around here would just love it!
I have found your blog thanks foodgawker and I can say that I love it ;))))) Great recipes and lovely pictures!! I’ll surely come back as soon as possible to visit you again :))) Have a nice day, Erika from Italy
A follow-up question…how do you think this cake would do as cupcakes? I need to make 36 for my daughter’s school next week, and I thought springy, lemony cupcakes might be a good choice.
Mmm, such beauty! I love lemon cakes and this one looks like an awesome recipe to try 🙂 Thank you so much for sharing!
@Jessica – Good question, I’m honestly not sure. I’ve never tried to make any bundt cake into cupcakes so I might not be the best person to offer advice. I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t work, but I guess there’s only one way to know for sure 🙂 Let me know if you end up trying!
Lemon cakes are my favorite. Looks so good!
love, love, love lemon, this is so cute!
What a perfect lemon bundt cake! Congrats on the Top 9 today. Well deserved!!
Just made this cake and it was divine! I added poppyseeds and would highly recommend doing so 🙂
@Jessica this recipe would be great for cupcakes, I will definitely be doing so in the future
@Tracey I LOVE your blog and this recipe is fantastic, many thanks. Just one thing I noticed was it was unclear when to add the sugar zest to the flour mixture. Otherwise this is a great recipe 🙂
@Judy – Thanks so much for your kind words! I’m glad the cake turned out well 🙂 On your recommendation, I modified the recipe to make it more clear.
Well, that is dramatically different with the less butter. I am a sucker for lemon desserts, so I would be calling a friend for backup, for sure!
This cake looks perfect for Spring! I’ve been making lemon everything recently!
I cannnnnot wait to give this recipe a go! Thanks for sharing. I am a nerd for bundt cakes.
This cake looks fantastic! I love lemon bundt cakes and I too love the way a glaze runs down the side of a bundt. You have a great site too. I look forward to reading more.
Looks lovely! I love all things lemon, so I’ll be giving this a try very soon 🙂
Gorgeous! I love lemon pound cake, but I have only had a boxed cake version. I can’t wait to give this a try. Thanks!
I’ve been craving a lemon pound cake but I think I just found out that I changed my mind, I want this! Thanks for posting.
More lemon flavor than any cake you have ever made? Whoa…hold the horses, am copying and pasting this one into my recipe files right now. Love that…and you are so good at the drizzle! This looks so pretty.
This cake looks to die for. I have everything but the cream of tartar. Do you think I can omit it?
@Anonymous – I think it’ll probably be fine without the cream of tartar. It’s a really small amount and probably just helps to stabilize the egg whites.
Good luck, hope you enjoy it!
baking this now and our house smells heavenly. i’m sure it’ll taste as good as it looks :] thank you for the recipe!
I can’t stop making this cake! In June and July, I think I made it every week. Any time a dessert was needed, there was this lemon cake. It’s so lemony! When I first looked for a lemon cake, I tried to find the most lemony one out there, and this was it. I use a different glaze, which is basically just a ton of lemon juice cooked with a little sugar to make it even more lemony. Thanks for the recipe! It’s hands down the best lemon cake I’ve ever had.
Love your site!
Is this cake moist? Have you made the CI Lemon Bundt that uses all butter?
Thanks!
Jen
@Jen – Sorry for the delayed response to your question. I definitely thought this cake was moist and really lemon-y too! I haven’t made the all butter recipe, but this one was based on that recipe – they just tried to make it a little lighter with the oil. If you decide to try it, make sure you use whole milk rather than a reduced fat version – I think you’ll like it 🙂
I can’t wait to try this bundt cake!