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A British baking classic, lemon drizzle cake should be included in every baker´s repertoire! It is not too tricky to make and the sharpness from the lemon and sweetness from the sugar are a match made in heaven!
Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezy!
The best thing about making a lemon drizzle cake is that it is not a lot of work but produces the most amazing, spongy, sticky, delicious cake! Minimum effort – maximum satisfaction as Gino D´Acampo would say!
Once you have weighed out all your cake ingredients, the recipe follows a simple all-in-one method: Put all the ingredients into a bowl, mix and bake! Easy peasy lemon squeezy (literally)!
If, like me, you also love traybakes, check out my post on 5 Amazing Traybakes that are great for parties, bake sales and get-togethers!
A few tips for success…
Make sure you put on the lemon drizzle whilst the cake is still hot. That will ensure that the juice seeps into the cake and the granulated sugar crystallizes on top as the cake cools!
It´s important that you use granulated sugar to make the crunchy topping for the lemon drizzle cake. If you use caster sugar the granules will be too fine and will seep into the sponge, not leaving a nice crunchy top as granulated sugar does.
When buying your lemons, make sure that they aren´t waxed. That will make them a lot harder to grate the zest from them. You might want also want to opt for an organic version since you are using the zest.
Essential Equipment for making Mary’s Lemon Drizzle Cake
This lemon drizzle cake recipe is based on the one from the Queen of Baking herself – Mary Berry. You can find the original recipe here or in her book, Mary Berry´s Baking Bible. That is probably one of the best baking books out there, and is on my list of Top 5 Books every GBBO fan needs! Below you will find the recipe with my notes to hopefully make things a little easier!
This cake is best made as a traybake and can then be cut into 18 large squares. I really recommend using a brownie tin like this. It’s not too expensive (£10), of really good quality and is definitely a worthwhile investment!
This is the same tray I also use to make the BEST EVER Chocolate Brownies, these amazing White Chocolate and Raspberry Brownies, my Best-Ever Carrot Cake Traybake, this Cherry and Chocolate Traybake (Kirschli Kuchen) and my Biscoff and Apple Traybake.
The squares of Lemon Drizzle Cake are perfect for a bake sale or for serving at a family get-together – but beware of sticky, sugary fingers!
More Lemon Baking Recipes
Lemon is such an amazing flavour to add to cakes! I just love it! If you are also a fan of lemony bakes, you should definitely check out some of my other recipes on this blog!
- Mary Berry´s Lemon Meringue Pie
- Homemade Lemon Curd | Baking Basics #9
- Mary Berry’s Lemon and Yoghurt Cake (One of the MOST POPULAR recipes on my blog!)
- Lemon Cupcakes with Lemon Curd
- Lemon and Poppy Seed Drizzle Cake
- No-Bake Lemon Cheesecake with a Gingernut Base
- Mini Lemon Fairy Cakes
For more great baking recipes, check out the baking section of my blog! Or if you are looking for some great new cooking recipes, have a little browse here.
Mary Berry´s Lemon Drizzle Cake
Recipe
Ingredients:
FOR THE CAKE:
- 225g butter, softened
- 225g caster sugar
- 275g self-raising flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 4 medium eggs
- 4 tbsp milk
- zest of 2 unwaxed lemons, finely grated
FOR THE LEMON DRIZZLE:
- juice of 2 lemons
- 175g granulated sugar
YOU WILL ALSO NEED:
- Traybake Tin (30x23cm)
- baking paper
Method:
- Grease and line a traybake tin (30x23cm) with baking paper.
- Preheat the oven to 160°C.
- In a large mixing bowl, mix the butter, sugar, flour, baking powder, eggs, milk and lemon zest for about 2 minutes until smooth. It is quite a thick batter.
- Spoon all of the lemon drizzle cake mix into the prepared tin and level the surface.
- Bake in the preheated oven for about 35-40 minutes until the top is golden brown, springs back when you press down on it lightly and the cake starts shrinking away from the sides of the tin.
- Place the cake onto a wire rack and leave to cool for a few minutes in the tin.
- In the meantime, make the lemon drizzle. For this, squeeze the juice of the lemons into a small bowl, add the sugar and stir well.
- Carefully remove the cake from the tin, remove the baking paper and place back onto the wire rack.
- Then spoon over the lemon drizzle, making sure to cover all of the cake to ensure a crunchy topping throughout.
- Leave to cool completely before cutting into 18 squares.
