Lemon cake has no flavor

Question

I have tried and tried numerous recipes for lemon pound cake. None of them taste very lemony. I tried adding extra lemons n lemon extract but no real difference. The only thing to make it taste like lemon is the glaze. What am I doing wrong?

Answer 1

The 'lemony' flavour in a lemon cake is from the volatile oils which are present in the fruit's zest,(mainly nerol, limonene and citral). I would'nt advise adding actual lemon juice to the cake as it will disrupt the ratios in the cake recipe and ususally the tart, zingy flavour gets lost anyway after baking. To get a really lemony flavour whilst still using a pound cake recipe (using the creaming method) there are several things which would enhance the lemon flavour:

• Adding finely grated lemon zest to the sugar, then blitzing with a blender (to release the oils) and leaving to infuse. The sugar is simply a medium to infuse into
• Melting the butter (using it as a 'quasi' solvent) and adding it to some more lemon zest to infuse. Then once cooled use it as per the recipe requires.
• Add lemon extract too (we're trying to get as much flavour as possible into the cake!)

And if all else fails, you can always soak the cake in a lovely tangy lemon syrup and may be top it off with some lemony cream cheese frosting!

Answer 2

I know of three ways to add extra lemon flavor to recipes:

1. Add lemon pudding like this copycat recipe for Starbuck's lemon poundcake:
   Starbucks Iced Lemon Pound Cake Copycat Recipe

2. Use frozen lemonade concentrate instead of lemon juice

3. as Marge suggested, add grated lemon rind. Fresh is good, dried is more intense.

My mother's cherished lemon-nut bread recipe, which uses dried grated lemon peel, actually requires the bread to be wrapped and refrigerated overnight to "cure" the flavors after it is baked.

Answer 3

Here are a couple of ideas:

* Add some limoncello to the batter

* After baking and initial cooling: Apply a lemon sugar syrup.
  In detail: Use a skewer to make holes in the cake. Pour over
  the lemon syrup.

* Use lemon curd as a topping

Here is an example of a recipe with lemon syrup: http://thesupertaster.com/wordpress/2010/01/31/baked-goods-lemon-syrup-cake/