lemon poppyseed pound cake

Cutting the lemon
the knife
leaves a little cathedral

— from ‘Ode to a Lemon’, Pablo Neruda

It’s been so long since I put a recipe on this blog (or even really thought about it), and I was content to let this space go dormant. But the kids saw it open on my computer the other day (I was looking for an old recipe) and they insisted we bake a cake on the weekend to add to it. Turned out that baking and styling and photographing and eating was quite the lovely way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

For our first collective effort, we settled on this lemon poppyseed pound cake because we had baked a version the weekend prior and we knew it was delicious—buttery, zesty, unfussy. This version is a two-thirds version of a full loaf cake, a size I love because it gets eaten while still so fresh (for us, that means baking it on a Saturday morning and it’s gone by Sunday evening).

Enjoy!
Sarah x

lemon poppyseed pound cake

Ingredients

125g unsalted butter, at room temp.
134g granulated sugar
2 eggs
Rind of 2 lemons, finely grated
140g plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
25g poppyseeds
Juice of 1 lemon
80g yoghurt, plain or Greek

Drizzle
Juice of 1 lemon
1 cup icing sugar
1 tsp poppyseeds

Method

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees celsius. Butter and flour (or line with baking paper) a small loaf tin.

Using a stand mixer (or just good ol’ elbow grease) cream together the butter and sugar until well combined and fluffy.

Add the eggs one at a time, mixing each one until incorporated. Then add the lemon zest and mix through.

In a separate bowl combine the flour, baking powder and salt. Add to the butter batter and mix until just combined.

Stir through the yoghurt and lemon juice until you see no more streaks of yoghurt.

Fold through the poppyseeds.

Transfer to the prepared loaf tin and then into the oven for 35 – 40 mins, or until a skewer comes out clean. Leave to cool on a rack for 10 minutes before turning out and letting cool completely.

While the cake cools, make the drizzle by combining the lemon juice and icing sugar. Add more juice sugar as needed, until you have a runny consistency. Pour or drizzle decoratively over the cake. Add the remaining teaspoon of poppyseeds and tuck in!

Will last for three days in a sealed container.