The Best of Ina

I'm a huge fan of Ina Garten from the show "Barefoot Contessa" on The Food Network channel. I love her show and I really love her cookbooks. Most of the time, I can rely on her show to give me great recipe ideas without all kinds of crazy, hard-to-find ingredients. Her dinner recipes are good, but her dessert recipes are even better! I love chocolate as much as the next girl, but sometimes I get a craving for something lemon. This lemon cake is so dense and rich, almost like a heavy pound cake. You don't even need a mixer to make this!


Lemon Yogurt Cake (recipe by Ina Garten)


Ingredients:


1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1 c plain whole-milk yogurt
1 1/3 c sugar, divided
3 large eggs
2 tsp grated lemon zest (2 lemons)
1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1/2 c vegetable oil
1/3 c freshly squeezed lemon juice


For the glaze:


1 c confectioners' sugar
2 Tbsp freshly squeezed lemon juice


Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour loaf pan. Line the bottom with parchment paper.

2. Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt into one bowl. In another bowl, whisk together yogurt, 1 c sugar, eggs, lemon zest, and vanilla. Slowly whisk the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. With a rubber spatula, fold the vegetable oil into the batter, making sure it's all incorporated. Pour batter into prepared pan.

3. Bake for 50-60 minutes, or until a cake tester/toothpick placed in the center comes out clean. Meanwhile, combine the 1/3 c lemon juice and remaining 1/3 c sugar in a small bowl.

4. Heat lemon juice and sugar in a small sauce pan over low heat until the sugar dissolves.

5. When the cake is done, allow it to cool in the pan for 10 minutes. Then remove from pan and place on a cooling rack over a cookie sheet. While the cake is still warm, pour the lemon sugar mixture over the cake and allow to soak in. Cool.

6. For the glaze, combine confectioners' sugar and lemon juice and drizzle or pour over cooled cake. (I omitted this step. This cake was sweet enough on it's own.)

So moist, delicious, and half-way gone!

Stay tuned for an AMAZING chocolate cake recipe from Ina coming soon!