Ingredients
Lemon Cake
1 cup unsalted butter
1 ¼ cup castor sugar
½ cup light brown sugar
4 large eggs
1 tablespoon Vanilla Essence
3 cups flour
1 Tablespoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
1 cup Buttermilk
Zest and Juice of 2 lemons
1 ½ cups blueberries – fresh or frozen (if using frozen then add to mixture frozen ie. Not thawed)
1 tablespoon flour
Cream Cheese Icing
250g full-fat cream cheese
½ cup unsalted butter (115g)
3 ½ cups icing sugar
1 tablespoon heavy cream
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
Instructions
Lemon Cake
To make the cake, first preheat the oven to 180C and grease 3 round cake tins (I put wax paper at the bottom of mine too)
With an electric mixer, beat the butter on high speed until smooth and creamy.
Add the castor sugar and brown sugar and beat on med-high for 2-3 minutes until creamy.
Add eggs and vanilla and beat on high until everything is well combined, 1-2 minutes.
Scrape down the sides of the bowl and then add the flour, baking powder and salt. Beat on low speed for literally 10-15 seconds.
Add the buttermilk, lemon zest and lemon juice and manually mix the mixture until everything is just combined. Mixing for longer will result in a tough, dense cake.
Dust the blueberries in a tablespoon of flour and then fold into the cake mixture.
Divide the mixture equally into the 3 cake tins and bake for 20-30 minutes at 180C or until a toothpick inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean (the original recipe quotes a time of 20 minutes although mine took almost 40 minutes so start watching from about 20 minutes as all ovens and baking conditions differ. Also I used frozen blueberries in my cake which could have created more liquid and hence further cooking time…so just be aware that it could take 20 or 40 minutes or longer!)
Remove cakes from the oven and allow to cool completely before icing.
Cream Cheese Icing
Beat the butter until smooth and creamy.
Add the cream cheese and beat again until smooth and creamy.
Add the icing sugar, cream and vanilla essence and beat until the mixture is smooth and all the icing sugar has been combined. For a thicker consistency add more icing sugar and for a thinner consistency, just add more cream.
To ice the cake, place the first layer on a flat surface and ice the top, then place the second layer on top of that and ice the top of that, and lastly, place the third layer on top of that and ice the top of the cake and the sides of all the layers, distributing the icing evenly. Decorate with lemon zest and / or blueberries.
