Lemon drizzle cake

 My friend Tina of Tobyboo was doing a pop up shop in Clerkenwell this week so in the interests of doing my bit I decided to bring cake to keep the spirits up and put an end of the week spring in the step. So I plumped for a spring time favourite of Lemon Drizzle cake. (See what I did there!)

You will note that I have suddenly used ounces instead of grams. It's how I remember this all-purpose-been-around-forever recipe for a basic sponge to be flavoured however you please. 2 eggs to 4oz each of flour, sugar and butter. (In the interests of clarity though, 4oz is the less easy to remember 114g.)

Ingredients

Cake
2 eggs
4oz  Flour
4oz Sugar
4oz  Butter (I use salted and don't add the customary pinch of salt.)
4 Lemons (This is possibly one of my least thrifty recipes but I like a lemon cake to taste lemony. Adjust to personal taste and the size of the lemons!)

Top Tip: If you are using a lemon for cooking zest it first and freeze the zest for using later. It makes a recipe like this a lot more economical.

Icing
1 lemon
50g Icing sugar
Sugar
Water

Method

Cake
1. Heat the oven to180C/350F/Gas 4 and grease the tin you plan to use. (I went for a loaf tin because I like a loaf cake and it's easier to transport than a round cake.)
2. Finely grate the zest off 4 of the lemons and put aside.
3. Cream together the sugar and butter until it looks light and fluffy.
4. Beat the eggs and mix into the sugar and butter.
5. Add the flour (sieving it is worthwhile but not vital) and mix in.
6. The mix should drop off of the spoon/mixer. If it doesn't add a splash of milk.
7. Add the lemon zest.
8. Resist the urge to eat the lot now and put the mix into the tin and in the oven for 20-25 minutes. (When a skewer/knife/pointed implement comes out of the cake clean it's ready.)
9. Leave aside to cool.

Icing
1. Carefully peel the zest off the lemon with a lemon peeler. You need to avoid the white, bitter pith. Cut it into thin strips.
2. Put about 2 cm of water into a small saucepan and add 3 tablespoons of white sugar. Heat the water and sugar until it boils, keep stirring it, then add the  lemon zest. (Maintain the heat but make sure the sugar syrup doesn't burn.) When the zest starts to look transparent and sugary take it out using a slotted spoon and leave it too cool on a dish.

Top Tip: Making this over the weekend I decided to drizzle the  lemony sugar syrup over the cake before icing it. Very successful. It gave a slightly crunchy layer. Yes it is naughty but it is cake after all!

3.Squeeze the juice out of the lemon. Run the juice through a tea strainer to make sure it is totally clear of bits. (Not essential if you don't have a tea strainer.)
4. Put the icing in a bowl and add the lemon juice slowly while mixing the icing. When the icing is thin enough to be slightly runny but thick enough to stay on the cake start drizzling. (I find that carefully spreading it with my fingers gives me more control over where it drizzles.)


7. After the icing has started to set and isn't drizzling everywhere arrange the peel in a random pretty pattern on the cake.

Top Tip: The sugary pan will be a pain to clean. Fill it with water and boil. This will dissolve the sugar and make cleaning it a lot less painful.

Eat with plenty of tea and chat.