It’s basically summer! Considering for the past few weeks have been nothing but a lot of rain, I wanted to make something to hopefully bring the summertime a little sooner. Pink Lemonade Cake seemed like the perfect answer. I recently also bought some Pink Lemonade Tea from David’s Tea. Paul and I made it as iced tea, and it was phenomenal. The cake came out of that love of Pink Lemonade, and love of cake in general.
I found the original recipe here, and didn’t really make any changes to it. The funny thing is that I had to make this cake twice. The first time I made it, I had invited my dear friend Sandi over for dinner. I made lasagna rolls and this cake for dessert. To be completely honest, we pretty much demolished this cake. By the time she left, there was only about half of the cake left, because I sent her home with a huge piece as well.
The other reason that I made this cake twice is because the first time, the cake stuck horribly to the inside of the bundt pan. When it came out, half of it was still inside the pan, and it did not look nice at all. I mean at all. It tasted great, but not pretty. I hate posting anything that looks as bad as that cake did, so I found a recipe for a Miracle Pan Release.
Now, I was a bit skeptical about this pan release, but after the first failed try (where the recipe called for an ungreased pan), I was willing to try it. There was a huge improvement. While the cake still stuck a little bit, it was nowhere near as bad as the first time. In fact, with the glaze over the cake, you can barely tell.
Go on and help welcome summer with this cake. You won’t be sorry!
Ingredients
Yield: 1 10-inch bundt cake
For the cake:
5 large eggs, divided
1½ c. flour
1½ c. sugar, divided
2 tsp. baking powder
½ tsp. salt
2 tbsp. lemon zest, or 1 tsp. lemon extract
2/3 c. lemon juice
½ c. canola oil
4-5 drops red food colouring
½ tsp. cream of tartar
For the glaze:
1½ tbsp. lemon juice
1 tsp. lemon zest, or ½ tsp. lemon extract
1-1½ c. icing sugar (as needed)
Preheat the oven to 325°F.
In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt and mix well. In a small mixing bowl, combine the egg yolks, lemon zest or extract, lemon juice, oil, and food colouring. Add the liquid ingredients to the dry ingredients and whisk until well combined.
In the bowl of a mixer, start whipping the egg whites until foamy. Add in the cream of tartar and the remaining sugar, and whip until soft peaks form. Add 1/3 of the meringue and whisk into batter until smooth. Add the remaining meringue and fold gently into batter.
Grease and flour a bundt pan (I will post the recipe for the pan release soon!), and pour the batter into the pan. Bake for 50-60 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Leave in pan for 5 minutes, then invert onto wire rack to cool.
When cool, transfer to serving plate. In a small bowl, mix the ingredients for the glaze. Consistency should be not too thick, but be able to smoothly run off the whisk or fork. Drizzle over cake slowly, then slice and serve.
Sugar and Spice 