Lemon cake for a spring day

Well, it finally feels as though Spring might possibly arrive again. It seems to have been grey and miserable for far too long, and here in the North West of England, we didn't even have an exciting snowy break at the beginning of February (although actually I'm quite glad about that because I didn't really fancy driving in the snow, although it did look very pretty on the news bulletins!). So I am now waiting for spring. Things have buds on them, my daffodils are fighting (the losing battle) against the slugs and might attempt to flower at some point and there are snowdrops. Yes, it's time to celebrate Spring. And what better way to celebrate than with a light lemony cake. This isn't the kind of dense soaked in syrup drizzle loaf affair, but is somewhat lighter and more victoria sponge like.

I decided to go for lemon through and through. Lemon zest in the cake batter, lemon buttercream icing and a lemon water icing to top it all off. Lemon is the name of this celebration, with its lovely bright colour and gorgeous scent, it just says happiness and Spring to me.

Lemon through and through cake
Ingredients
4 large eggs
225g softened butter
225g caster sugar
225g self raising flour
1 tsp baking powder
grated zest of 1 lemon

For the buttercream
75g very soft butter
150g icing sugar
grated zest of around 1/4 lemon

For the lemon water icing
130g icing sugar
juice of around 3/4 lemon (obviously depending on how juicy your lemons are!)

Method
- Place the butter and sugar in a large mixing bowl and cream together with an electric whisk until light and fluffy.
- Add the eggs, flour and baking powder and combine thoroughly until light and evenly textured.
- Divide between the two prepared cake tins and place in the oven. Bake for 30-40 minutes. Mine took 40minutes, but were perhaps slightly overdone.
- Remove from oven and when cooled enough to touch remove from tins and remove baking parchment (if used). Allow to cool completely on a wire rack.

For the buttercream, cream together the butter and icing sugar until light and fluffy. Add the zest and mix through. When cakes are completely cooled, sandwich together with the buttercream.

For the lemon water icing, add sufficient lemon juice to the icing sugar to make a thick icing and pour and spread it over the top.

Decorate as you wish - had I been more organised I would have bought all yellow flowers to decorate the top. As it is, I had to do the best I could with yellow, pink and white. Well, at least you can tell it's home-made!!!

Light, lemony and delicious, this is the perfect cake for welcoming Spring this year! Roll on the warmer weather!