Lemon Cake with Lemon Curd and Cream

In another round of cooking inspired by The Great British Baking Show, my wife and daughter decided to make the fanciest lemon cake ever. They found the recipe on the BBC web site. Here it is!

This was the destination--would you like directions?

Lemon Cake (Americanized ingredients)

• 350g/12 oz butter, softened, plus extra for greasing 
• 350g/12 oz granulated sugar
• 4 lemons, zest only, plus juice of 2 lemons
• 6 eggs
• 6 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 10 1/2 oz cake flour
• 2 oz cornstarch

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Grease and line with parchment paper three 8-inch cake pans.

Cream the butter and sugar together in a bowl until pale and fluffy. Add the lemon zest and juice.

Slowly beat in the eggs, one at a time, until the mixture is well combined.

Method to ensure no shells get in the mixture

Adding the egg

Whisk the baking powder, cake flour, and cornstarch together in a bowl and fold into the cake mixture.

Combining dry ingredients

Folding

Divide the cake batter among the three pans and bake for 25-30 minutes or until risen and golden-brown. Remove from the oven and set aside to cool for 10 minutes. Run a round-bladed knife around the inside edge of the pans to loosen the cakes. Remove the cakes and set aside to cool completely on a rack.

Cool cakes

For the lemon curd

• 60g/2 1/4 oz butter
• 225g/8 oz granulated sugar
• 3 lemons, juice and zest
• 2 eggs

While the cakes are cooking, make the lemon curd. Heat the butter, sugar, lemon juice, and zest in a bowl set over a pan of simmering water, stirring occasionally until the butter has melted and the sugar has dissolved. (Do not allow the base of the bowl to touch the surface of the water.) Remove from the heat.

Meanwhile, beat the eggs in a separate bowl. Slowly whisk the melted butter mixture into the beaten eggs until well combined.

Whisky business

Set the bowl over the pan of simmering water and cook, whisking constantly, for 2-3 minutes or until the mixture thickens enough to coat the back of a spoon. (It took more like 10 minutes for our curd to thicken. Possibly we used too large a bowl, which made the mixture take too long to heat. We got there eventually, though.)

Sieve the lemon curd into a clean bowl, then cover with cling film and set aside to cool.

Lemon curd almost ready

For the filling, prepare whipped cream using your favorite recipe, until soft peaks form when the whisk is removed. The British recipe uses double cream. That is a milk cream with a level of fat unavailable in America.

Place one of the cakes onto a serving plate and spread with the lemon curd.

Starting to spread the curd

Just about done

Spread over some of the whipped cream and sandwich with another cake.

Whip cream layer

Repeat the process with the remaining lemon curd, whipped cream and cake tiers. Dust with icing sugar.

Dusting the cake

Taking out a slice

Final luscious product (drizzle left over curd if you have any)