I might just have found my new favourite cake

‘I might just have found my new favourite cake’ is a blog post title I’ve been toying with for a while. Until now I’ve resisted it on the grounds that I’m always finding new favourites. It might be something I’ve baked myself, it could be something delicious winking at me suggestively on a coffeeshop counter, telling me how well it would go with a black Americano. Or it could be a picture in a cookbook, leaving me with no choice but to add the book to my library and the recipe to my ‘must bake’ list. Whichever way you look at it I’m a bit of a tart when it comes to cakes. Free and easy with my emotions and always falling in love. Which probably means this will become an ongoing series rather than a one off favourite cake post.

My latest crush is a lemon, raspberry and courgette cake. Baked last weekend when my partners son came to see us, it ticked all the boxes for the celebratory cake I’d been tasked with making. We ate the final slice yesterday and I’m already looking for an excuse to make another.

Putting courgette, or zucchini as you might know it, in a bake was a new thing for me but I will definitely be trying it in others now. In principle there’s no reason you couldn’t substitute it into any carrot cake recipes you may have. The one thing you must do though is squeeze as much of the water out of the vegetable as you can after you’ve grated it. You’ll be amazed how much is in there and if you don’t get it out you could be left with a very wet cake batter that will struggle to bake.

Although this recipe does make quite a large cake it’s a very light and delicate sponge which I don’t think you’ll have any difficulties finishing.

Ingredients

• 250g softened butter
• 1 courgette, grated
• 200g caster sugar
• 1 tbsp lemon thyme leaves
• 1 large lemon, grated zest and juice
• 200g plain flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 3 large eggs
• 150g mascarpone cheese
• 2 tbsp milk or cream
• 100g lemon or raspberry curd *
• Raspberries, enough to decorate the top of the cake
• Icing sugar

*I used some raspberry curd which I already had in the fridge. If you want to increase the lemon flavour of the cake this Ruby Tandoh recipe makes wonderful lemon curd

Method

• Preheat the oven to gas mark 4. Grease and line 2 20cm cake tins.
• Grate the courgette. The best was to get the water out is to wrap the grated courgette in a clean tea towel and squeeze it. Don’t worry of it’s still a little wet but try to get as much water out as you can.
• Cream the butter, sugar, lemon thyme and lemon zest until light and fluffy.
• Sieve the flour and baking powder together
• Beat the eggs into the butter and sugar mix one at a time. With each egg add a tbsp of the flour.
• Once all of the eggs are in add the rest of the flour and mix again. Then add the lemon juice followed by the grated courgette.
• Divide the mixture between the two prepared tins and bake for 25 to 30 minutes. 
• Mix the mascarpone with the icing sugar. Then add the milk or cream to loosen the mixture. 
• Spread the mascarpone mix on one of the sponges. Top this with some fruit curd and then place the other sponge on top.
• Decorate the top of the cake with raspberries and icing sugar.