I think everyone’s mouth watered during Lisa’s description of her fabulous July 4th blow-out. At the request of a reader, here’s a recipe from the menu: Lime Pound Cake with Raspberry Sauce. It’s our first two-page recipe, but don’t worry, Lisa talks you through it. Enjoy!
Lime Pound Cake with Raspberry Sauce
From Lisa Clark
This is a rich cake with a subtle but substantial lime taste. It’s a favorite at my house. If the pound cake is warm and slightly under-done, it’s okay. In fact, it’s more than okay.
Cake
3 1/4 cup cake flour
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
18 Tbsp. unsalted butter
8 oz. cream cheese
3 cups sugar
6 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
3 Tbsp. fresh lime juice (I usually squeeze and zest two limes)
2 tsp. lime zest
Glaze
1/4 cup fresh lime juice (I usually use a bottle of key lime juice: have you tried to squeeze 1/4 cup of limes? It’s hard.)
3/4 cup granulated sugar
Raspberry Sauce
12 oz. frozen raspberries
2 tsp. lemon juice
3 Tbsp. sugar
Cake
1. If you remember, put out all the ingredients at room temperature. Position your oven rack on the lower third of your oven and Preheat to 325. Grease and flour a bundt pan.
2. Sift (I rarely do, but I’ll leave that choice to you) together flour, soda and salt. Set aside.
3. In electric mixer, beat butter and cream cheese until creamy and smooth. Gradually add the sugar and continue beating, occasionally scraping down the sides of the bowl until light and fluffy (about 5 minutes). Increase the speed to medium-high and add the eggs, on at a time, beating well after each addition and, again, scraping down the sides of the bowl. (Don’t give up!) Beat in the vanilla and lime juice.
4. Reduce the speed to low and fold in the dry ingredients, blending and scraping down that bowl some more. (It doesn’t take as long as these instructions may lead you to believe.) Using rubber spatula, fold in zest. (Seriously, don’t forget the zest–it makes a difference. It will make your kitchen smell good, too!)
5. Spoon batter into pan, making sides about one inch higher than the center.
6. Bake until golden and tester comes out clean–about 1 hour and 15 minutes (my oven always takes longer for everything) Let cool on wire rack in pan for 10 minutes.
Glaze
Whisk together juice and sugar. Generously brush surface of warm cake with glaze. Let cake cool completely before serving.
The glaze is important because it seals in the cake and keeps it moist and creates those yummy, crunchy, lime-infused crusty bits on the edges that are so delicious to eat at midnight, over the sink. It will be hard to wait for the cake to cool before you eat it, but I never said it would be easy.
Raspberry Sauce
Puree raspberries (I like mine slightly cool or at room temperature) in a blender, or smash them together if you don’t want to dirty the blender. If you hate seeds, press through a fine sieve.
Finally, drizzle with raspberry sauce. (Or serve hot, slightly under-cooked, with a spoon: you will think you’ve died and gone to heaven.)
Or, click here for a printable PDF (two pages).
For our international friends (hello!) this is what a bundt cake pan looks like. I think another shape would work out just fine, but I am not a perfectionist in the kitchen.
