Birthday Lemon Cake

When it’s my birthday, it’s the perfect time to bake a cake without feeling guilty about the extra calories!

Because it’s very hot (and I didn’t really want to spend a lot of time in front of the stove), I resorted to my favourite cake recipe – delicious and spongy lemon cake. It’s so easy to make that even a novice cook can master this recipe.

Put it on the table:

There are only a few ingredients needed to make this delicious cake – you probably have it all in your pantry.

Ingredients for the easiest cake ever

Cake Ingredients:

250 g soft butter or margarine

500 ml (2 cups) castor sugar

5 ml (1 teaspoon) grated lemon zest

6 eggs (room temperature)

625 ml (2½ cups) cake flour

15 ml (3 teaspoons) baking powder

250 ml (1 cup) sour cream

Just follow these easy steps and you are guaranteed a delicious cake.

  • Place the butter, sugar and lemon zest in a bowl and mix it well until light and creamy.

Mix until fluffy

  • Beat in the eggs one at a time, beating well after each egg.

Add one egg at a time

Cake mixture after all the eggs have been beaten in

  • Now it’s time for the dry ingredients. Sift the flour and baking powder together and fold them into the mixture.

Sift in the dry ingredients

Fold dry ingredients into the mixture

  • Finally, it’s time to add the sour cream and then gently fold in until just combined.

Add sour cream

It was at this time that I looked for my round cake pan – only to discover that it was still at our house in Langebaan. But Plan B worked well and a round cake now suddenly became a square cake. Grease your pan (or glass bowl in my case) thoroughly with margarine/oil and spoon your batter into it.

My not-so-round cake ready for the oven

Place the cake batter in a preheated oven of 180°C/356°F and bake for about 1 hour or until done.

Let the cake cool in the pan before turning it out on a wire rack. This was the hardest part for me as I had to get the cake out of the glass bowl … but wonder of wonders, everything ended well!

Not perfect, but smelled wonderful

This cake can either be decorated with the icing or icing sugar can just be sifted over the top. But it is my birthday after all, so the occasion called for a little extra effort.

Icing ingredients

Icing Ingredients:

100 g (100 ml) soft butter or margarine

500 g (2 cups) icing sugar

Lemon juice or milk (I used lemon juice)

Beat the butter until it’s soft (and if you do it like me, you’ll have to wipe chunks of butter off the kitchen wall later)!

Butter (most of the 100 g) whipped until soft

Add the icing sugar and beat well until well combined and spreadable. Add a little lemon juice (or milk) to soften icing.

Icing ready for the cake

Spread over the cake and make it smooth (or not – as in my case). I topped it off with a handful of pink ‘angel drops’.

My very own birthday cake

And how does one enjoy cake? Of course, with a cup of tea or coffee. But when celebrating a birthday, it calls for a glass of sparkling wine!

Birthday cake and sparkling wine