This Easy Lemon Snacking Cake with Lemon Frosting is an all-in-one fluffy cake recipe topped with the most luscious lemon buttercream. The result is moist and zesty and everything that you want a lemon cake to be. The cake is super easy to make, and has given me fool-proof results every time. The frosting is my absolute dream – light and fluffy and full of big lemon flavours!
An all in one cake means that you don’t need to cream butter and sugar and should find this incredibly easy. You need to put everything in one bowl, combine and bake! The snacking cake element just means that it isn’t a full celebration sized cake. I make this in an 8×8″ square cake tin, resulting in a smaller amount of cake. This is much more manageable for families or smaller households. That said, feel free to double up and make a full celebration cake with round cake tins.
This is a fabulous cake to make to bring into work or school, as it travels really easily. It’s a fantastic alternative to chocolate and feels much more Summery. This cake will store for a few days in an airtight container. Make sure to let the cake cool fully before frosting. For the best buttercream, and to make sure it doesn’t split, make sure your ingredients are at room temperature!
Tips for the best Easy Lemon Snacking Cake with Lemon Frosting
- Butter: If using real butter, make sure it is fully at room temperature and soft before adding. For margarine, you don’t need to leave it as long to come to temperature. Both give a great, fluffy result.
- Splitting: Due to it being an all-in-one recipe, and because there is a fair amount of citrus, the mixture may look a little split/curdled. If this happens, don’t be alarmed and proceed as normal. The outcome will be absolutely fine.
- Eggs: I use large eggs. If you have smaller eggs, you will just need to add a little more milk towards the end for a smooth batter.
- Lemon: Use unwaxed lemons as you want a lot of zesty flavour. That said, could add a dash of lemon extract too for an especially lemony taste. Additionally, for the frosting, you could add yellow food colour to give it more of a lemony look, but that is totally optional.
- Frosting: This recipe creates a good thick layer of frosting. To prevent the buttercream from splitting, make sure your butter (and all other ingredients) are at room temperature.
For this Easy Lemon Snacking Cake with Lemon Frosting I use a basic 8′ square pan (I like this one), and recommend using an electric or stand mixer to really combine the butter and sugars (with a mixer like this). If you’re after more fruity recipes, try these Passion Fruit Martini Blondies. For videos and baking inspiration, head on over to my Instagram.
Easy Lemon Snacking Cake with Lemon Frosting
Ingredients
- 180 g Plain Flour
- 180 g Granulated Sugar
- 1.5 tsp Baking Powder
- 3 Large Free Range Eggs
- 180 g Softened Butter/Margarine
- Zest of 1 Lemon
- 2 tbsp Milk
For the Frosting
- 120 g Unsalted Butter Room Temperature
- 290 g Icing Sugar
- Zest of 1 Lemon
- 2 tbsp Lemon Juice
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180C fan/200C/400F/gas mark 6 and line an 8 inch baking tin.
- In a large bowl/bowl of a stand mixer, add all the cake ingredients and combine until smooth. If very stiff, add a little more milk. Pour into tin and bake 20-25 minutes, until golden and a skewer inserted comes out clean. Let cool.
- Once cool, make the frosting. Add the butter to a large mixing bowl. Beat with a whisk on high for a minute to soften/combine everything.
- Add half the icing sugar, whisk on high. Then add the lemon juice and remaining half icing sugar and whisk everything on high until fluffy. Add passion fruit/icing sugar as required to meet your desired consistency. Spread over the cooled cake, top with a little lemon zest slice and serve!
