Lemon Drizzle Cake

 It was my besties birthday at the start of March and what better way to show her some love them trying to kill her off with one of my awfully made cakes? - Well there not awful all the time, just most of the time. But I digress! One of her favourite tastes is the more bitter lemony kind so I decided to try my hand at a lemon drizzle cake. I've never made it before and didn't think making a trial one first was needed. Not because I was confidant in my efforts but for fear I'd eat it. Yup, big blonde girl would go to a whole new level - big blonde girl with cake shaped lump in stomach. Sexy.

I took this recipe from my Marks&Spencers Grandmas Best Recipes, 2010 edition.

The Cake:

200g/7 oz of plain flour *

2 tsp of baking powder

200g/ 7 oz of caster sugar

4 eggs

150ml/ 5 fl oz of sour cream

A grated rind of 1 large lemon

4 tbsp of lemon juice

150 ml/ 5 fl oz of sunflower oil

The Syrup:

4 tbsp of icing sugar

3 tbsp of lemon juice

Don't forget to turn on the oven on! 180C/ 350F/ Gas Mark 4

*I only had self raising, which didn't make a massive difference if thats all you have!

1. Sieve (feck in) flour and baking powder into a bowl and stir in caster sugar.

2. In a different bowl, whisk the eggs, sour cream, lemon rind, lemon juice and oil together.

3. Pour both mixtures into one bowl and mix well. - It didn't say not to use a mixer so I did.

4. Lightly grease a 20cm/8inch loose-bottom round cake tin and line the base with baking paper. This bit is super important and a bit fecky to do but you'll make your life so much easier and keep the cake in one piece if you do it.

5. Pour the mixture into the tin (and make sure the baking paper is as close to the sides of the tin as you can get it) Then bake for 45-60 minutes until its risen and golden brown. Mine took 50 mins.

6. While the cake is baking make the syrup. Mix together the icing sugar and lemon juice in a small pot. Stir over a low heat until its just beginning to bubble and turn syrupy. 

7. As soon as the cake comes out of the oven prick the surface with a fine skewer and brush the syrup over the top. Leave it to cool in the tin before turning it out. 

The outcome? It tasted good and worked for the most part, but next time I'm going to do it, I'm going to make a lot more syrup and maybe even add a tiny bit more sunflower oil to try and make it more moist as I found it slightly dry. I was reassured that it tasted lovely by everyone and all I can say is this proves how lovely my friends are! Another thing is the baking paper is see damn hard to hold and not get half the cake mix behind it, so if available, call for extra hands for that bit. 

Thats all for now, I hope if anyone bakes this it turns out fab! Oh, and don't misread the ingredients list like I did and get 500mls of sour cream instead of 150ml *facepalm* - hands up who knows what I can do with 350ml of sour cream!? I made other nomish things for my friends birthday which I will blog about another time so it doesn't turn into a mad backfiring baking blog! Have fun baking x