Recipe: Lemon Bundt Cake

Serves 12

INGREDIENTS

• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 cup buttermilk, room temperature
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 3 lemons, zest grated and saved (will need 3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice)
• 2 1/4 sticks unsalted butter, cut into chunks and softened
• 2 cups sugar
• 3 large eggs, room temperature
• 1 large egg yolk, room temperature

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Note: The cake has a light, fluffy texture when eaten the day it is baked, but if well wrapped and held at room temperature overnight its texture becomes more dense--like that of pound cake--the following day.

PREPARATION

Adjust an oven rack to the lower-middle position and heat the oven to 350 degrees. Prepare a 12-cup Bundt pan by making a simple paste from 1 tablespoon melted butter and 1 tablespoon flour and applying it with a pastry brush. Thoroughly coat the surface of the pan, including all the nooks and crannies.

Zest the lemons and mince to a fine paste. In a small bowl, soak the lemon zest in the lemon juice. Whisk the flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda together in a medium bowl. In a small bowl (or preferably a liquid measuring cup), whisk the buttermilk, vanilla, and lemon mixture together.

In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugar together with an electric mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy, 3 to 6 minutes. Whisk the eggs and egg yolk separately and then beat in half of the eggs into the butter mixture. Once incorporated, beat in the other half of the egg mixture.

Reduce the mixer speed to low and beat in one-third of the flour mixture followed by half of the buttermilk mixture. Repeat with half of the remaining flour mixture and the remaining buttermilk mixture. Beat in the remaining flour mixture until just incorporated.

Scrape the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top. Wipe any drops of batter off the sides of the pan and gently tap the pan on the counter to settle the batter. Bake the cake until a wooden skewer inserted in the center comes out with a few moist crumbs attached, 45 to 60 minutes, rotating the pan halfway through baking.

Let the cake cook in the pan for 10 minutes, then flip it out onto a wire rack. Let the cake cool completely, about 2 hours, before serving.

ENJOY!