Don't be timid about trying your baking hand on this cheerful lemony dessert! Gather eggs and pansies from your local farm and create this luscious three-layer springtime cake.When you are experiencing a stormy, wind-tossed, rainy day jam-packed with warnings and watches from your local weather station, sit near your cellar door away from any windows and imagine baking this fairy-tale cake. It doesn't have to be for a special event, except perhaps that you have survived yet another frightening, warm-weather storm.
I hurried down to Tulip Tree Farm on Main Street in Hampstead to buy my colorful, pastel eggs that make me think that Easter is always. Tulip Tree Farm presently has Auraucana hens (green and blue eggs), Cuckoo Maran (dark, chocolate brown eggs), Danish Brown Leghorns (white eggs), Silver Lace Wyandottes (brown egs) and New Hampshire Reds (brown eggs). They are fed a balanced diet of grain and greens, and have free access to roam around, peck bugs, and roll in the dirt. They take dust baths and sun themselves, and with a rooster around they primp and prance. Every so often, I borrow the best behaved New Hampshire Red hen who has good acting skills to become Miss Maggie Hen, the beloved pet of Nora McCabe's, from my novel, The Irish Dresser. Miss Maggie and I then go to a local school to entertain the students and talk about my books and writing. One time, Miss Maggie squawked with an Irish accent and laid a magic egg.
And I didn't forget to purchase packs of pansies this year from Tulip Tree Farm, as well. These pansies are not sprayed and can be used to sugar and decorate cookies, cupcakes, and cakes. This year, I bought every variety and some were lacy with varying shades of blue, yellow, and violet. Placing them in teacup pots to sit on my porch each spring is a declaration of hope while the remnants of winter still cling.
This cake is an adaptation of the lemon cake recipe I found on www.marthastewart.com.
INGREDIENTS
2 sticks of unsalted butter, room temp (I use Cabot's)
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (leveled) (I use King Arthur)
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp. salt
zest of one medium lemon
2 cups sugar
2 large eggs, plus 3 large egg yolks
1/4 cup plus 2 Tbs. fresh lemon juice
1 cup low-fat buttermilk (I use Kate's)
jar of lemon curd (found in jam and jelly section of grocery store)
lemon drops (buy a bag from the candy store)
sugared pansies (sugared by delicately brushing a little egg white that is mixed with a few drops of water onto each flower and sprinkling with super-fine sugar, air dry away from spring-time ants, and they will harden and look delightful atop your cake)
DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and spray or butter (I use Pam and flour, tapping out excess flour into sink) three cake pans. In a medium bowl, whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and lemon zest.
2. In a large bowl, using an electric mixer, beat butter and 1 1/2 cups sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs and yolks on low, one at a time. Beat in the 2 tablespoons of the lemon juice. Alternatey beat in flour mixture and buttermilk, ending with flour mixture; mix until just combined.
3. Divide batter between pans; smooth tops. Bake until cakes pull away from sides, about 30 to 35 minutes. Let cool in pans 10 minutes and run a knife around edges of pans and invert cakes onto a wire rack.
4. While cakes are baking, bring remaining 1/2 cup sugar and 1/2 cup water to a boil in a pan. Add remaining 1/4 cup fresh lemon juice into syrup.
5. Poke holes in warm cakes on rack with a toothpick and then brush cakes with the lemon syrup. Let cool completely. Prepare frosting.
SEVEN-MINUTE FROSTING (I use the recipe on page 602 from The Fannie Farmer Cookbook, Thirteenth Edition); you can find many recipes online and in other cookbooks. The key thing I have learned about making this frosting over the years is to use fresh eggs and be patient. Seven minutes can feel like a long time standing over a stove, but it's well worth the effort.
ASSEMBLING (use your own personal touches)
Place first layer on cake stand, spread gently with lemon curd; place second layer atop cake, spread gently with lemon curd (use your judgment as to how much, keeping more in the middle for it will squeeze to the sides).
Place third layer and frost entire cake with seven-minute frosting, making swirls and peaks. Decorate with sugared pansies and place lemon drops around the bottom. Sometimes I use cut off skewers (thin) to hold cake together until serving (it might slide)
Voila! Eat cake and celebrate another day of living!
(my photo has a pansy and some yellow mums decorating the top, but I usually only use sugared-pansies, sometimes pressing on the sides of cake as well)
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