Me and my little cake are off to an online party – yipee!  Look, healthy cake!  Have another slice.  It’s sunshine in a moist fluffy sponge with the tanginess of lemon warmed up by cardamon hovering in the background.  So are you game for this fast and easy sugar-free Lemon and Cardamon  cake made with spelt flour? Are you dancing around right now, waving your arms and shouting ‘Finally!  A healthy cake I can make in less than an hour!’?  Everyone sing along ‘We all love a healthy healthy cake, healthy healthy cake, healthy healthy cake’ (to the tune of ‘Yellow submarine‘)!  A couple of chickens on the tea-towel seem to be walking away from the cake, but pay no attention to them.  Hmm, might tell you about our family tea towel fetish one day… want to see my collection later?

But back to the Lemon Drizzle, which was inspired by fellow bloggerettes Fimnora (Quantum Hermit) and Michelle (Caffeinated Musing) who both recently mentioned it as a favourite cake of theirs, with Fimnora specifying a sugar-free one.  Well, I happen to luuuv citrus cake and I’m on healthy cake week so was delighted to adapt and play around with Amber Rose’s recipe (from ‘Love, Bake, Nourish’) to produce a cake that’s ‘good for you’ but also lemonly decadent.  Magic.

Inspired as it was by my bloggerette friends, it seems fitting I should take it along to the online anniversary Friday Fiesta Party hosted by the Novice Gardener.Everyone takes a little something along.  As a newbie I realise my offering should be some super duper multi-layered creation, but I’m taking this cake because it can be scoffed by partygoers with high cholesterol (me!) or with an aversion to that monster of all monsters:  sugar (yum! Sorry, just kidding).  And it’s made with spelt flour so should be easier to digest, which means you can eat more of everything else.  You see how my mind works.

Now there’s a little problem.  You might have noticed it’s not very ‘celebratory’ and a bit of a plain cake (sorry cake!) and we’re both a bit nervous about turning up underdressed but not very good at getting dolled up.  You can see our sorry effort further down the page and might feel the urge to help us out with makeover tips.  But next time I go to a Friday Fiesta Party I’ll be accompanied by a ‘wowy’ cake.  Okay, now I’m giving my truly delicious lemon drizzle cake a complex so I’ll stop (sorry again cake! I know, you’re ‘wowy’ on the taste buds).  And yes, I speak to my cakes.

Anyway, enough faffing around mate (said with British accent).  Let’s have that recipe!

Preparation

Pre-heat your oven at 180°C (static, non-convection oven) or 160°C (fan-assisted oven).

Butter and flour a loaf tin or line a silicon tin with greaseproof paper.

Ingredients

Sponge

To be beaten together in the big bowl (but start with just butter in the bowl) – all at room temperature:

• 94g unsalted butter (softened)
• 130g maple syrup (the good quality 100% natural stuff – a bit pricey, sorry!)
• 98g beaten egg (you can have 1 egg yolk and the rest as egg white)

Whisk together in a smallish bowl:

• 110g white spelt flour
• 21g ground almonds
• 1 generous teaspoon baking powder
• a pinch of salt
• 2 to 3 green cardamon pods – grind the seeds – optional

To add near the end (all at room temperature):

• 20g (about 1 and a half tbsp) freshly squeezed lemon juice
• grated zest from one lemon
• 25g (about 1 and a half tbsp) oatmilk – or any other kind of milk

Drizzling syrup

• 28g (about 2 and a half tbsp) lemon juice
• 22g (about 2 tbsp) maple syrup

Lemon icing (optional)

• 25g ground xylitol (sugar substitute) – or icing sugar
• 1 teaspoon freshly squeezed lemon juice

Method

The sponge

1. Beat then whisk the softened butter till it has a nice creamy consistency.
2. Add the maple syrup and whisk patiently till it’s absorbed and the mixture is cream-like again.  If it starts curdling it might be the 2 ingredients were at different temperatures, so heat it a little while you whisk (eg. over a gas flame or bain marie).  It should become creamy again in around.. er.. 5 or 10 seconds.  Keep whisking if it needs longer … it will happen eventually! 
3. Add the beaten egg little by little, whisking between each addition.  If it looks like it’s curdling, add a spoon or 2 of the flour mix and keep whisking. 
4. When the mixture is light and fluffy and the egg all combined (it might look a little dodgy but that’s okay), fold in the flour mixture (flour, ground almonds, baking powder, salt and cardamon) with a rubber spatula and figure of eight motions.   
5. It will be a bit dry but when the flour is more or less combined you can add the lemon juice, zest and oatmilk.  Keep folding gently to combine all the ingredients but don’t overfold – the mixture should have a ‘dropping consistency’ so when it’s held up in the air with your spatula, it should start dropping down with a ‘ploof!’.
6. Pour gently into your prepared loaf or cake tin and smooth down evenly with the back of a metal spoon.  Place in the oven and bake for around 25 to 30 minutes (don’t open the oven door to check it before the 25 minutes are up!). 
7. While the cake is in the oven make the drizzling syrup:  just warm the maple syrup and lemon juice together in a saucepan on low heat, then leave to cool a little.
8. When you think the cake is ready, insert your cake tester skewer in the middle and if it comes out clean give your cake the all clear to leave the oven.  It should also spring back a little if pressed with your finger.
9. Leave the cake to cool 20 to 30 minutes in the loaf tin.  Then skewer holes all over the cake and pour your syrup over it as evenly as possible with a spoon.  Leave to soak in for a while until the cake is cool then turn out of the tin.
10. If you want lemon icing on your cake too, mix the ground xylitol and lemon juice to make a smooth paste.  You can put the icing it in a disposable pastry bag, cut the tip to make a small hole, and pipe lines across your cake. 
11. Eat the cake!

Testing and makeover

Yum yum?  My trusty new cake tester number one helped out here.  And also encouraged me to further develop the courgette and apple cake (on the table down there).  Thank you!

You can see our makeover attempt in the photo:  putting a few blueberries on the cake!  Pathetic I know but great tastewise as they go well with lemon.

The next attempt was drizzling lemon icing over the cake.  Ahem.  Must practice, as xylitol icing is a bit tricky to work with, but it’s most delicious.  I think it will do.  Off to the party taking one cake with icing and one without!

Party time

Join me at Fiesta Friday and we can sing our ‘We all love a healthy healthy cake’ song again.  The party lasts till Wednesday, if you want time to make a little something to bring along!  Or have your own private party at home with this cake.

The end is near on our Blogging 101 course – last day today and we’re winding things up this weekend.  It’s been a brilliant course. I’ve learnt a lot, created a better blog, met loads of excellent people and read masses of inspirational stuff.  We should all finish up with a big online party!!!  Stay in touch fellow bloggers and friends, and hope to see some of you on the Blogging 201 course!  🙂

And to all of you, including non-bloggers and visitors who’ve just come over from my new facebook page (welcome and nice to see you!):  ‘Live long, prosper, and bake!’, as Spock’s mother always said.

More healthy and unhealthy cakes are on their way, all muttering ‘Why couldn’t we go to the party too?’

Till next time, happy baking or drooling! 🙂

P.S.  Oops, forgot to show you my tea towel collection – another day…