Recipe: John’s Lemony Birthday Cake

Recipe Source: Peterson, James. Baking. Ten Speed Press, Berkeley, 2009 pp. 8 and 46

So, my husband decided to throw himself a birthday dinner. While the dinner was really just an excuse to make an obscene amount of ribs, you can't have a birthday party without a cake. I really didn't have time to get wild and crazy with it – we'd just gotten back from the big camping trip up in Maine and I still had to finish excavating the kitchen from that mess. I decided that a basic genoise with buttercream would be good. The idea of a "quick and easy" buttercream also appealed to me.

The biggest change that I made in this recipe was switching lemon zest for orange zest. I did this because my husband loves lemon and it was his birthday cake. The result I'd have to say was mixed. The cake fell apart on me – literally a quarter of the cake came out of the pan separately from the rest. That said, buttercream hides a whole host of sins. I don't think any of our diners would have realized that I'd screwed up on the cake if I hadn't told them. I personally found the cake a little dry, but people seemed to like it well enough. Then again, they could just have been being nice.

John's Lemony Birthday Cake (serves 12; approx. $0.57/serving)

3 eggs

¼ cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar

½ cup plus 2 tablespoons cake flour

3 tablespoons melted butter

1 ½ pounds butter, sliced

2 ½ cups confectioner's sugar

2 tablespoons grated lemon zest

Equipment:

• Stand mixer with both paddle and whisk attachments
• 9" cake pan
• Saucepan
• Small bowl
• Bowl that fits over saucepan (heatproof, please!)
• Cake rack
• Whisk

1. Preheat your oven to 350 ̊.
2. Lubricate and flour your cake pan.
3. Bring a saucepan of water to a bare simmer.
4. Combine the eggs and sugar in the bowl that fits over the saucepan. Whisk until warm and frothy.
5. Transfer the egg and sugar mixture to the bowl of the stand mixer and fit with the whisk attachment.
6. Whisk 4 minutes. Remove about 1/5 of the egg mixture and put it into the small bowl.
7. Carefully fold in the flour.
8. In the small bowl, combine the reserved egg mixture and the melted butter.
9. Fold the butter mixture into the flour mixture.
10. Spread the batter out evenly in the pan.
11. Bake 25 minutes.
12. Let cool 5 minutes in the pan, then turn out onto a cake rack.
13. Clean out the bowl of your stand mixer.
14. Beat the sliced butter for 5 minutes in the stand mixer with the paddle attachment.
15. Add the sugar and lemon zest. Beat until smooth. It is highly recommended that you start this on a slow speed or else your sugar will make a huge mess.
16. Switch to the whisk attachment and beat 5 minutes.
17. Slice your cool cake in half with a serrated knife.
18. Spread some of the buttercream frosting over the top of the bottom half, then carefully replace the top half.
19. Use the remaining buttercream to frost the remaining cake.
20. Decorate as you desire, then serve.

Comments

[Appointment Setting]

yum :)