i've been wanting to make something with lemon in it for a while.
steven's a chocoholic… so i have to decide to do these things without telling him… i'll just get discouraged hearing him say 'i don't really like lemon' HMPH!
but i found this recipe a while back, and after reading it, i couldn't stop thinking about it. it sounded perfect… lemony. fresh. sweet. perfect.
i had a few things that i had to collect before i could begin…
sigh. what have i told you about substituting things? please remind me next time i feel that i can't do something-when i just need to find a different way.
bought a cheese grater yesterday, one of those big fat ugly fancy ones. it has two sides that are 'zesters' or…whatever they want to call them.
they're really just shitty little teeth…
after a few tries and ruining my lemons and wasting their peel, steven suggested i use a serrated knife. PERFECT!
i 'peeled' it with the serrated knife- a regular knife will cut too deep and get yucky white pip. is that what it's called? i don't really care. we just don't want it.
after i had my pieces, i chopped them up as finely as i could.
next, get your carton of blueberries…
oogle at them because they are so pretty…
roll them around, eat one, oooh ahhh mother nature is a fine thing…
now stop that. get a hold of yourself, they're only berries.
now, put them in a bowl of water to wash.
ooooh but they're still so pretty.
drain them, leave them on a towel to dry and begin mixing your other ingredients.
in one bowl, 'sift' together flour, baking powder, and salt.
i say 'sift' because i don't have a sifter, and just use a whisk to add some air to it.
in another bowl- mix eggs, sugar, oil, yoghurt, vanilla extract and lemon zest.
once your pretty blueberries are dry, toss them in 1 tablespoon of flour.
mix the dry ingredients into the wet and gently combine. fold in the blueberries.
pour mixture into your prepared (greased and lined) 8 inch cake pan. (also. your oven should be preheated to 180C. i don't know what that is in F right now. look it up. oh sorry.. was that incredibly rude? here, i'll go find it for you… okay, it's about 355F.)
put in the oven to bake for around 45 minutes. (check it at 30 minutes just to see how things are going. my oven likes to cook hotter on one side. so i had to turn my pan-and bring it down one shelf after about 30 minutes of cooking)
meanwhile, cut one lemon in half and squeeze the juice into a bowl, we'll use this later.
while you're waiting and have those lemon halves there-that are already juiced, you could soften your elbows.
go ahead. just stick your elbows in them and sit there for 5 minutes.
i won't judge.
and time's up. take her out.
did i mention that i only used two eggs?
hahaha… i know. i did-because i only had two eggs, and didn't happen to have any other egg substitutes (bananas, apple sauce etc.) so you can see that my cake probably didn't get the amount of lift it should have–or maybe it didn't hold… i don't know. but it fell just a tiny bit, i will blame that on the lack of egg.
let it sit and cool…
i'm impatient.
oooh look! purple stuff.
or blueberries if you want to get fancy about it.
i peeled off the wax paper on the bottom…
isn't it pretty?!
too bad it's trash.
at this point, i put it in the fridge because… i'm impatient. i want to make the icing!
now, that bowl of lemon juice you set aside- combine 1 cup of powdered sugar into it.
once the cake has cooled, pour over the top and spread around
cut into cake and….
ARGH! WHAT IS THIS?! why are all of my blueberries at the bottom? hmph! that is not what it looked like in the recipe.
okay, so it isn't as pretty. but it DOES taste delicious.
one thing i would change? i probably wouldn't put the icing on the top-it was just a bit too sweet. i think the cake would have been perfect without it.
next time, i'll use three eggs.. and i might get smaller blueberries-and probably set them on top instead of folding them in, letting them work their way to the bottom.
but guess what?!
the chocoholic even liked it.
i'd call that a win.
