Week 2: Recipe 4: Lemon Cakes with Syrup

Recipe 4 of the 52 Recipes a Year challenge, and it occurs to me that I gravitate toward baking. Perhaps it's the December spirit lingering, but I find there is nothing like sharing a homemade treat wih family and friends. The fact that there is always a pack of flour in the house (leering at me), may have something to do with it. It's just too tempting to get my bake on.

Hence, these lemon cakes. 

Counting in the Fall Baking Challenge, these little cakes were among the best pastries I've made so far, which was a surprise. Since they look like muffins I expected the dough to be airy and the flavour mild (bland), but the lemon flavour was strong and the dough was substantial and tastefully sweet. (I must admit I did tweak the recipe a bit.) In short, these cakes are basically slices of pound cake disguised as muffins. As for the raspberries and the whipped cream, they were an okay but unnecessary addition. The whipped cream (unsweetened) added little to the texture of the cakes, which were moist enough to enjoy without additions, and the sour raspberries clashed a little with the sweet dough. Perhaps blackberries would have been a better choice. (Tweaked) recipe below, serves 6.

Ingredients:

• zest and juice of 1 lemon
• 100 grams flour 
• 1 tsp. dried yeast
• 50 ml milk
• 2 whisked eggs
• 40 grams full-cream butter
• 100 grams sugar
• 50 ml orange liqueur
• 125 ml whipping cream
• 125 grams raspberries
• pinch of salt 
• 50 ml water

Directions:

1.  Mix lemon zest, flour, salt, yeast, milk, eggs, butter, and 60 grams sugar. Cover with a clean kitchen towel and let batter rise in a warm place for 40 minutes.
2. Preheat oven to 200°C or 390°F. Scoop batter into muffin molds. Bake for 15 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, mix lemon juice, liqueur, 50 ml water, and the rest of the sugar in a saucepan. Bring to a boil and let simmer on low heat for 5 minutes.
4. Take cakes out of the oven and put them in a deep plate. Pour hot syrup onto them and let cool 1 hour. While they cool, pour syrup onto them a few times more.
5. Beat whipping cream until stiff. Serve cakes with wipping cream and raspberries.