Double Lemon Bundt Cake

Double lemon bundt cake is called double because we are giving it two layers of lemon. There is lemon in the cake itself and then the glaze has a punch of lemon too. My sister Megan appreciates lots of lemon, so a cake like this makes me think of her. This cake is moist, tart, tender and perfect. And during the cold winters months we are in right now, some bright lemon might just be what the doctor ordered.

Bundt cakes of years past

I wrote a cookbook a number of years ago. It is called “The Family Flavor” and you can buy it on Amazon. The book was incredibly rewarding to write and I don’t know if I will ever feel as accomplished as I felt the day it arrived in the mail. I learned a lot writing my book. Like I feel like I can write a recipe really well, like the technical part of it. And I learned how to do that consistently. I also learned how to take rejection better. I didn’t get all awesome reviews on my book and some of them were hard to take. I learned that it is impossible to write a book that everyone will like. I also learned that a bad review doesn’t erase all the good ones.

In that book, I wrote a recipe for orange cream cake. It has been a Christmas Eve tradition for many years since. It is just part of the days after Christmas now. You wake up, eat a slice of cake for breakfast and then go about your day. It is a jolly way to enjoy the Christmas break. I wrote this double lemon bundt cake recipe to be similar to that orange cream cake. Moist, flavorful, tart and only gets yummier as the days go on. Here are the ingredient particulars.

Butter

You can sub in vegetable oil for this recipe if you don’t have butter handy. It will taste great and still be super moist. When it comes to unsalted or salted butter, I am not strict. Whatever you have will work great. Don’t let all the Food Network chefs scare you about too much salt in your baked goods. I used to fall for that back in the day, but soon realized that it isn’t that consequential to use salted butter. However, whatever butter you choose, make sure it is room temperature.

Eggs

With the eggs, we want room temperature if at all possible. If you didn’t remember to leave some eggs out, don’t stress. Just put the eggs in a bowl and fill it with warm water for a little while. Like do that first thing when you go to make this recipe. It works great.

Granulated sugar

Typical cake, using a ton of sugar. We use 2 cups here. But what did you expect? It’s cake for goodness sake! That rhymes. I am a poet and I didn’t even know it!

Lemon zest and lemon juice

The fresher your lemons are, the more zest you will get. But it’s okay if they aren’t super fresh. Everything will still taste great. If you are still grated lemon zest on a box grater, I beg of you to buy THIS on Amazon. Do it. Just do it right now real quick.

For juicing, I use THIS guy and love it. Put your lemon halves in to the juicer cut side down and then juice it. It turns the lemon inside out, squeezing every bit of juice out of it.

All-purpose flour

I think you could use cake flour here no problem. In fact, I know I will try that next time I make this double lemon bundt cake. It is going to give us a more tender crumb, so why not.

Buttermilk

Buttermilk is the secret champ in any baked goods. And if it is room temperature, even better. To get my buttermilk to room temp, I just nuke it in the microwave for 30 seconds.

Why do I keep blabbing about everything cold not being cold? Because cold will seize up all the other room temperature ingredients. For example, if you have room temperature butter, but not eggs and buttermilk, the butter is just going to get cold and not blend as nicely throughout the cake.

The lemon syrup

Part of what makes this double lemon bundt cake is the syrup you brush on it after it is baked. We do not do equal parts lemon juice and sugar. We actually add a little extra sugar and that gives us more of a thick glaze that makes it shiny and pretty. As you can see from the pics, she is very shiny and pretty.

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