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Easy Lemon Cake

A community recipe by

Not tested or verified by Nigella.com

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Introduction

This light fluffy cake is ideal for a quick tea treat.

This light fluffy cake is ideal for a quick tea treat.

Ingredients

Serves: 4-6 People

Metric Cups

For the Cake

  • 250 millilitres self-raising flour
  • 10 millilitres baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla essence
  • 125 millilitres butter (melted)
  • 180 millilitres caster sugar
  • 2 large lemons (juice and rind)
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 pinch of salt

For the Glaze

  • 125 millilitres sugar
  • 1 large lemon juice
  • 50 millilitres butter

For the Cake

  • 9 fluid ounces self-rising flour
  • fluid ounce baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla essence
  • 4 fluid ounces butter (melted)
  • 6 fluid ounces superfine sugar
  • 2 large lemons (juice and rind)
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 pinch of salt

For the Glaze

  • 4 fluid ounces sugar
  • 1 large lemon juice
  • 2 fluid ounces butter

Method

Easy Lemon Cake is a community recipe submitted by ChrisRSA and has not been tested by Nigella.com so we are not able to answer questions regarding this recipe.

  1. Pre-heat the oven to about 180C/gas mark 4.
  2. Line a small cake tin with baking paper and butter.
  3. Sift all the dry ingredients together.
  4. In a separate bowl mix butter and sugar then add eggs one at a time beating in between each egg, lastly add the lemon rind and lemon juice together with the vanilla essence.
  5. Now finally add little bits of flour to the wet mixture and beat each time.
  6. Now place in cake tin and bake for about 45 minutes depending on your oven.
  7. About 10 minutes before the cake comes out of the oven melt the sugar, butter and lemon juice together and pour over the hot cake.
  1. Pre-heat the oven to about 180C/gas mark 4.
  2. Line a small cake tin with baking paper and butter.
  3. Sift all the dry ingredients together.
  4. In a separate bowl mix butter and sugar then add eggs one at a time beating in between each egg, lastly add the lemon rind and lemon juice together with the vanilla essence.
  5. Now finally add little bits of flour to the wet mixture and beat each time.
  6. Now place in cake tin and bake for about 45 minutes depending on your oven.
  7. About 10 minutes before the cake comes out of the oven melt the sugar, butter and lemon juice together and pour over the hot cake.

Additional Information

You could also use butter cream, cream, cream cheese or even creme freche to decorate the cake instead of the lemon Sugar sauce.

You could also use butter cream, cream, cream cheese or even creme freche to decorate the cake instead of the lemon Sugar sauce.

Tell us what you think

What 7 Others have said

  • I loved it, but, like all the recipes I find online, I add a variation to my version that delicately enhanced the Lemon Flavour and added more moisture to the overall end result. Instead of 125ml butter, I used 1tspn Willow Creak Lemon Flavoured Extra Virgin Olive Oil and 100ml butter, which I melted slightly in the microwave with the Lemon Rind in it. Everything else in the recipe I followed exactly. The end result was sweet AND delicately tart. I have crowned it, 'Sansa Starks Lemon Cakes', after my Love for GOT S5

    Posted by AzizaKhan on 11th December 2016
  • Amazing cake ever. Just follow the instructions and you are good to bake a mouth watering moist lemon cake. Absolutely loved it. The measurement for dry ingredients are in ml so you definitely got to convert it into grams 250ml = 121.5g for flour.

    Posted by Ilovemybaby on 2nd July 2015
  • This was the perfect lemon cake! I used high grade flour and regular sugar cos that was all I had in the pantry. 3 medium eggs and a tsp of baking powder. Worked beautifully! Yes, mls and grams are not the same and this recipe calls for mls so use yr measuring cup - it turned out nicely for me. Thanks for the awesome and amazingly simple recipe. I am all for simple recipes when it comes to regular home baking. Will be my go to easy recipe from now on! :)

    Posted by lazyjane on 7th February 2015
  • As I was going through this recipie it was a tad confusing. in the ingredients it has all the measurements in ml not grams. I thought solids were meant to be in grams? when it says the dry ingredients it only means the flour and the baking powder I think? it wasn't very clear From the final product it was a bit thick so I added a teaspoon of milk. when I tasted it raw it was very bitter. I'm yet to get it out of the oven!! hope its good !

    Posted by Shonnyy on 10th July 2014
  • I too disagree with the first comment. No.1 rule is to read through the recipe first and then start. I found the recipe extremely easy to follow and make. My cake came out perfect and extremely perfect timing for my mom's birthday. She loved it of cause!

    Posted by Alley15 on 23rd January 2014
  • I disagree with the comment above. The recipe delivers on its promise. So few ingredients! It was very easy to make and rose beautifully even with all purpose flour. Use super fine sugar (the North American equivalent of caster's sugar). Best of all, it was moist and quite lemony because of the rind (lemon pulp). The perfect recipe for lemon layer cake, which I will try next time! CanSan.

    Posted by srosier on 18th January 2014
  • I have had several issues with this recipe. First, it calls for self-raising flour, but adds baking powder and salt- confusing? Then, it asks you to mix all the dry ingredients, I didn't notice until later that this was only the flour, not the sugar! The timings do not indicate what kind of pan should be used, leaving me to wing it. I think this needs a bit of proof-reading and fleshing out!

    Posted by nancinette on 22nd October 2013
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