A Glut of Lemons!

One of the lovely things about living in Sydney is that the climate is just right for growing citrus fruits and I'm lucky enough to have a lemon tree. There is nothing nicer, I think, than being able to go out and pick a lemon from the tree to go in my G&T! Well, this year the tree went bananas and produced all these lemons (it is only a little tree!) so I've been busy using them.

As luck would have it the Pantry Challenge on Vi's Pantry has a Lemon Pound Cake. This was posted by Granny, a whizz in the kitchen if ever there was one! After reading the recipe and seeing the photo I made for the mixing bowl pretty quickly. The sponge is a lovely simple but tasty one and it rose beautifully. It also turned the most lovely golden brown and it almost seemed a shame to put the icing on it. However, this Lemon Pound Cake is on a mission to be tomorrows pudding before we all go out to watch The Wallabies (Australia) play the All Blacks (New Zealand) in what I hope will be a great rugby match. The lemon butter icing is the crucial 'gold' in my 'green and gold' decoration for the Aussies!

Lemon Pound Cake

250g/9oz unsalted butter, softened

250g/9oz caster sugar

2 tsp finely grated lemon zest

1 tsp natural vanilla extract

4 free-range eggs

250g/9oz self-raising flour,

sifted lemon butter icing

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4.

2. Grease and line the base of a deep 20cm/8in square baking tin with baking paper.

3. Beat the butter and sugar with an electric whisk until pale and creamy. Beat in the lemon zest and vanilla extract.

4. Add the eggs one at a time, beating until just combined after each addition.

5. Fold in the sifted flour in two batches until well combined.

6. Spoon into the tin and bake for 40-50 minutes, or until a skewer poked into the middle of the cake comes out clean (you can cover the cake loosely with foil if it is browning too quickly).

7. Cool for ten minutes before removing from the tin and turning out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Ice with lemon butter icing.

Lemon Butter Icing

75G/3oz Unsalted butter

100G/4oz Icing Sugar

2 teasps finely grated lemon zest

2 teasps lemon juice

Beat the butter until soft and white. Add lemon zest and juice Gradually beat in sifted icing sugar Spread over the cake

If you follow all these instructions then this is what you get!!