Just a lovely, simple Lemon Cake recipe – perfect tea time treat. You’ll love the bright lemon flavour, that it’s so beautifully moist and only requires one bowl and a whisk!
Finished with a lemon glaze, this is a simple cake that you can whip up on short notice. Yoghurt keeps the cake moist so it lasts for days and days! It’s the same batter used in this Blueberry Lemon Cake and Strawberry Cake.
Lemon Cake recipe
This Lemon Cake is one of my emergency quick and easy cake recipes, something I can get in the oven super quickly when I’m short on time. There’s no creaming of butter required, it’s a quick dump-and-mix cake. (When I’m longer on time I might instead plump for this sponge-based Lemon Cake with Fluffy Lemon Frosting …)
The “secret ingredient” in this is yoghurt. Yoghurt is a brilliant baking ingredient because it thickens the batter which means less flour required which = more moist cake. 🙂
I love how golden brown this cake is straight out of the oven. It almost glows!
Lemon Glaze
In the spirit of this being a simple teacake, I keep the frosting simple too. I just use a Glaze or a quick Cream Cheese Frosting.
For the glaze, I like to make the glaze a bit thicker than typical glazes because it adds that extra oomph of sweetness and stickiness to the cake, as opposed to cutting it in half and sandwiching it with something.
Added bonus: I love how the drips look and how the glaze isn’t see through.
If a glaze isn’t your thing or you want more frosting, I’ve also included my quick Cream Cheese Frosting. This is different to the usual Cream Cheese Frosting I use for things like Red Velvet and Carrot Cake which requires a stand mixer and a good 7 minutes of fast beating.
In the spirit of the simplicity of this quick Lemon Cake recipe, I use my shortcut Cream Cheese Frosting which I make simply by mixing spreadable Cream Cheese (comes in tubs, not blocks) with lemon juice and icing sugar. No stand mixer required, no need to even wait to soften the cream cheese. Just mix it up with a wooden spoon, dollop and spread. 🙂
You know that pretty cake decorations aren’t my thing. I’d probably spend more time styling a giant plate of slow cooked meat than I would spend decorating a towering cake! 😂
So in my usual form, I’ve kept it nice and simple – just some lemon slices and a few sprigs of baby’s breath from a bunch I happened to have.
This cake may be simple but in all honesty, it’s probably the cake I made most often last year. I actually intended to share it earlier this year, but then I got all excited because blueberries came into season so I published the Blueberry Lemon Cake instead (same cake, but with blueberries).
So I sat on this Lemon Cake recipe for a couple of months until an adequate amount of time had passed. And finally, I’m sharing it! – Nagi x
More quick, emergency cakes
No creaming butter, no stand mixer for any of these!
WATCH HOW TO MAKE IT
Watch how to make this lemon cake!
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Glazed Lemon Cake recipe
Ingredients
Wet:
- 2/3 cup / 165 ml vegetable or canola oil
- 2 eggs
- 1 ½ tbsp grated lemon rind (1 large or 2 medium lemons)
- ¼ cup / 65 ml fresh lemon juice
- 1 cup / 250g plain yoghurt (Note 1)
- 1.25 cups / 275g caster sugar (superfine sugar, granulated ok too)
Dry:
- 2 cups/300g plain flour (all purpose flour)
- 4 tsp baking powder
- Pinch of salt
Glaze:
- 1 3/4 cup / 210 g icing sugar (powdered sugar)
- 1 tbsp lemon juice
- 1 1/2 tbsp plain yogurt
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 180C/350F (standard) or 160C/320F (fan/convection). Grease a 20 cm / 8” cake pan with butter.
- Place Wet ingredients in a bowl. Whisk until combined.
- Sprinkle over flour, baking powder and salt. Whisk until smooth – few small lumps is ok.
- Pour into pan – it should be fairly thick but pourable (see video). Bake for 50 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.
- Remove metal ring and cool on rack then glaze.
Glaze:
- Place ingredients in a bowl and whisk until smooth. Test down the side of the bowl to get the right thickness, using 1 tsp of yoghurt at a time to thin it out if required. Glaze should drip (slowly, because it’s thick) but not be see through.
- Place rack on a tray or baking paper.
- Pour glaze over the middle of the cake, gently push towards the edges so it drips down the sides.
- Let it set for 1 hour before transferring to a serving plate.
- See note for how I did the lemon slices in the photos, and the alternative quick Cream Cheese Frosting.
Recipe Notes:
Nutrition Information:
LIFE OF DOZER
You can just imagine the thoughts running through that furry head:
“Will I make it to the door??”
“How hard would it be to scoff it down on the run??”
“I wonder if she’s going to frost it? 😳 Maybe I should wait…”
I’ve made this recipe numerous times and it’s come out perfectly every time. It keeps really moist for a few days ( it’s so delicious it won’t last that long lol ). Really easy to make
Lemon cake heaven! The best lemon cake I have ever made. I used avocado oil and jalna lactose free Vanilla yogurt. Thank you Nagi for sharing this gem recipe!
Made this cake this morning. We’ve just had some for afternoon tea….it’s absolutely delicious, moist and has a lovely lemony flavour. I’ll definitely make this again. Thank you for your amazing recipes.
Naji, many thanks for sharing another brilliant recipe.
Made this for my wife’s tennis club friends – rain cancelled the game. We are eating it at home. The ladies will have to wait until next week; will make another one.
Followed your instructions exactly. Used 160 degrees with fan. Cooked in 60 minutes.
Moist, great flavour a real winner.
Many thanks, Ian.
Baked for 40mins only. Cake turned out perfect. So tasty, moist and the outer crumb perfectly golden with a pleasant firm texture giving way to the perfectly soft and fresh yellow cake inside.
I messed up the glaze, it was too thin, but otherwise SO GOOD
So easy and so delicious. I did mess up the glaze but the cake was perfect. Baked for 40mins. Crust was deliciously golden and crispy and the cake so moist and flavourful.
Delicious, big hit with family and friends. I cook for 30-35 minutes and I find it come out lighter and less crispy around edges.
This cake is beautiful, I love lemon so I did use a whole extra large lemons zest and an extra tablespoon of lemon juice. I cooked first 30min on 170 and then 35 on 160. Came out big and fluffy and didn’t sink. (This is the second time I have made this in 2 weeks) I used the glaze for first one and cream cheese icing for this one. Really moist and delicious if you love lemons like me.
Mine stuck on one side of the pan even though it was greased. It also sunk in the middle a bit. Used fresh everything so not sure what went wrong. This was for work so ummm….bit disappointed….
Hi Rox. I’m about to make this cake on a rainy morning here in Perth. I’m thinking maybe your oven might not be heating evenly. Just a thought.
If I made this in a loaf tin what would the cooking time be?
How can this be made without the 1/4 cup of lemon juice? I have one that doesn’t care for lemon. Thank you
You realise this is a lemon cake recipe, right? You could always select one if Nagi’s other cake recipes if you don’t want to put lemon in a lemon cake!
Large eggs or medium?! Also, giving fat by weight rather than in ml would be super useful! 💖
Delicious- moist, perfect lemon level and moreish. Found better in my oven to take out at 40-45 min.
This cake is delicious and so easy to make, I reduced the sugar. Also, I needed to add more lemon juice for flavour. Nagi, we love your easy recipes!
Hi Nagi, I love your recipes so much- thank you. With the lemon cake. How long should I could if I make that in a loaf tin please?
Hi, Excited to try this. Will it work just as well in a bundt cake tin or would I need to make any adjustments to cooking time/temperatures, etc?
Made this cake once with 180C oven no fan and turned out well. However tried with fan forced at 160C and cake was not done at 50min. Should the fan forced temp be at 170C instead? Usually the fan forced temp is 10C lower not 20C….
So this turned out a bit of a disaster for me, although I think I was probably the tin size. What I thought was an 8 inch tin is actually 7.5 inch, and the batter came up near the edge! I figured at worst I’d get a giant lemon muffin… After an hour it was almost burned on top, and I took it out if the oven. It sank only slightly in the centre. When cooled, I gave it a gentle prod to check the springiness of the cake, but the top just kind of fell in and revealed a CAVE inside this cake! It’s now more like a giant doughnut. The outside bits are still delicious so we will eat those 🙂
Next time I’ll use a bigger tin, or maybe a bundt tin, or scoop some of the batter into muffin cases. Just a warning to anyone whose tins are not exactly 8 inches!
My cake sinks from the middle. What I am doing wrong. Please help me as this cake is delicious. Thanks.
Delicious, light and fluffy! I added a tbsp of poppy seeds and made it in a bundt tin (baked for 40min) and the cake still turned out great.
Another flawless recipe as usual, Nagi, thanks!
I only wish you liked bananas as I’d love a good banana bread recipe 😉