richard I’d never made a lemon cake before and we have thyme aplenty on the balcony so how about a lemon thyme cake as featured in the Observer mag a few weeks ago? Oh and the cake master herself was coming to visit Yumblog Junior, perhaps I could show off my culinary skills – she’s tasted my flapjacks and chocolate biscuits, now to join the big boys in the cake room.
Preparation time: 15 minutes
Cooking time: 45 minutes
Skill level: easy
Makes: 1 cake
Recipe: Nigel Slater
Ingredients
For the cake:
- butter – 200g
- caster sugar – 200g
- plain flour – 100g
- baking powder – ½ tsp
- ground almonds – 100g
- 4 large free-range eggs
- 1 lemon
- thyme leaves – 1 tsp
For the topping:
- sugar – 4 tbsp
- 2 large lemons
- thyme leaves – ½ tsp
Start by lining a 19cm x 9cm loaf tin with baking parchment
Preheat the oven to 170C (gas mark 3).
Cream together the butter and the sugar until pale and soft.
Sift together the flour and baking powder, and mix with the almonds. Lightly beat the eggs, then fold them into the mixture in 2 or 3 goes, beating them in thoroughly each time.
Grate the zest from the lemon and pound together with the thyme leaves. Add to the cake mixture with the flour, baking powder and almonds.
Spoon into the lined cake tin and bake for 45 minutes.
While the cake bakes, dissolve the sugar in the juice of the lemons over a moderate heat and stir in the thyme leaves (including a few flowers if you can). As soon as the cake is out of the oven, spike the surface with a skewer and spoon over the syrup. Leave to cool.
Verdict: It is moistness itself. Dense moist lemon with a twist of thyme.
Drink: Tea in finest bone china.
Entertainment: Granny playing with YJ.
I gotta say it : that looks damned delicious. Maybe tomorrow…