Dessert Day: Lemon Pudding Cake!

Lemon Pudding Cake

Each week I try to make one new dessert for Gilbert and I to splurge on.  I got the idea from my best friend Decoy Betty, who calls the days where she makes a new dessert, Dessert Day.  This week we made Lemon Pudding Cake!

When I was growing up my Mum used to make something called Chocolate Fudge Pudding Cake.  It always seemed like a magical dessert to me because it involved 1) making a batter and putting it in a pan then 2) pouring boiling water over it and sticking it in the oven and somehow it turned into something that was chocolate pudding on the bottom and chocolate cake on the top.  Last spring Gilbert and I went over for dinner and she made up a Lemon Pudding Cake for the first time.

It was amazing.  The top was light, airy and full lemon flavor.   The bottom was a perfect lemony pudding.  If spring had a taste, this is how I would imagine it.  Light and fresh.  But, over the course of the year I somehow forgot we loved this dessert.  Then I saw a recipe for it on the Pastry Affair and the memories came flooding back.

Lemon Pudding Cake

Ingredients:
3 tbs Unsalted Butter, at room temperature
3/4 cup Granulated Sugar, divided
2 Fresh Lemons, zested and juiced (about 1 tbs zest and 1/2 cup juice)
3 Large Eggs, separated
1/4 cup All Purpose Flour
1 tsp Vanilla Extract
1/8 tsp Salt
1 cup Milk
1/8 tsp Cream of Tarter
2 quarts Boiling Water

Directions:
1) Preheat oven to 325 degrees.  Grease 9-inch round baking pan.

2) In large bowl, beat together the butter, 1/2 cup sugar and lemon zest until light and fluffy.  Add in the egg yolks one at a time, beating between each addition.  Mix in the flour, vanilla and salt.  Stir in the lemon juice and milk.  It will be very runny.  Set aside.

3) In mixing bowl, beat the egg whites until soft peaks form.  Add in the cream of tarter and remaining 1/4 cup sugar and continue beating until stiff peaks form.  Mix 1/3 egg whites into cake batter until completely mixed.  Fold in remaining egg whites.

4) Transfer batter into the prepared baking dish (the cake will not rise to it's okay to fill the dish to the top).  Place the baking dish into a larger baking or roasting dish, add boiling water in the larger dish until it reaches halfway up the outside of the batter-filled pan.  Carefully transfer to the oven and bake for 50-60 minutes, or until the top becomes golden and the middle of the cake barely jiggles when shaken.  (Or if you have my oven check it at 40 minutes to make sure the top isn't becoming too dark)

Cool the cake to allow the cake to set.  Sprinkle with confectioners sugar if desired.