finding time for cooking
Lemon Ricotta Pound Cake
I actually made this about a month ago, but haven’t had a chance to bring its greatness to you yet. I love ricotta, and I love lemon, so this is a recipe tailor-made for me. First of all, it’s super easy—just blend everything together, throw it in a pan, and call it a day. But secondly, it can do double duty as both a breakfast and a dessert.
This is the perfect antidote to holiday food excesses. It’s light and sweet and tart, so a great alternative to all of the heavy, rich desserts we’re usually consuming this time of year. It would be great to have on hand for company to just snack on whenever they want.
If I had any complaints about this recipe, they would probably be about the texture, which can be a little dry, but since it’s pound cake that’s really more the nature of the beast. It’s good on its own, but even better with some tea or coffee.
I had some overflow batter, so I greased up a ramekin and baked little individual pound cakes. Next time I think I’d use a few more ramekins and do shallower mini cakes, or else it can get a little bread-y.
Preheat the oven to 350ºF and grease a loaf pan (and maybe an extra ramekin) or 3 mini loaf pans with butter. Stir together your dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, and salt) in a medium bowl. And zest your lemons.
Cream the butter, ricotta and granulated sugar in your mixer for a few minutes until it’s well blended and fluffy.
Add the eggs one at a time, scraping down the sides of the bowl. If your mixer is the kind you can keep running, then do that, otherwise run it in between adding each egg. Mix in the vanilla, lemon zest, and lemon juice.
Add the dry ingredients to the batter a little at a time, until they’re just barely stirred in.
Pour the batter into your greased pan. I had some extra so I poured some into a little ramekin as well.
Bake until a toothpick comes out clean and the cake pulls away from the sides of the pan. For a regular loaf pan, plan on 50-60 minutes, but add 2-3 minute increments until it’s done. Mine started to get too brown on top, so I loosely put some tin foil on top for a while. If you’re using mini loaf pans, it’ll probably be more like 40-45 minutes.
Let it cool in the pan for about 15 minutes, then run a knife around the edges of the pan, remove from the pan, and let it cool on a rack completely. Or just leave it in the pan.
You can serve fresh and hot, though I don’t like hot fruit things, so for me it was perfect the next morning, with a cup of herbal tea.
Lemon Ricotta Pound Cake
- 3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) of unsalted butter, room temperature
- 1 1/2 cups of cake flour (I used all-purpose)
- 2 teaspoons of baking powder
- 1 teaspoon of kosher salt
- 1 1/2 cups of whole-milk ricotta cheese
- 1 1/2 cups plus 1 tablespoon of granulated sugar
- 3 large eggs
- 1 teaspoon of pure vanilla extract
- Zest of 1 to 2 lemons
- 2 tablespoons of freshly-squeezed lemon juice (less than 1 lemon, generally)
Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Grease a 9x5x3-inch loaf pan (and maybe an extra ramekin) or 3 mini loaf pans with butter.
In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder and salt. Stir to blend.
Using your mixer, cream the butter, ricotta and granulated sugar until well blended (around 3 minutes, but less is okay). Add the eggs one at a time, running the machine in between each egg and scraping down the sides of the bowl. Add the vanilla, lemon zest, and lemon juice until combined. Add the dry ingredients to the batter a little at a time, until they’re just barely stirred in.
Pour the batter into the greased pan and bake until a toothpick comes out clean and the cake pulls away from the sides of the pan. Start with 50-60 minutes for a regular loaf pan, but add 2-3 minute increments until it’s done. If the top starts to get too brown, cover loosely with foil (I had to do that); for the mini loaf pans, 40-45 minutes should do it. Let it cool in the pan for about 15 minutes, then run a knife around the edges of the pan, and transfer the loaf or loaves to a rack to cool completely.
Original recipe here