On Sunday morning, I went to the Farmer's Market and noticed that Meyer lemons were available, so without knowing what exactly I would do with them, I bought four. Then, while walking the Dish with E and Christina, the subject of Bytes' lemon cake came up, and so I decided to make either lemon cake or lemon bars. The latter got ruled out because I had used my 9x13 pan for Saturday's apple tart, and the leftover tart in the pan was still at at Andrew's (along with my cookies-and-tarts spatula and my thin, perfect-for-cutting-bar-cookies-and-tarts butter knife). I could have used different pans, I suppose, but it was easier to simply decide on cake.
SmittenKitchen's
adaptation of Ina Garten's lemon pound cake recipe sounded as good as any. I halved the recipe but, other than reducing the sugar a little (as usual), put in the full 1/3 cup of lemon zest. The process of zesting four Meyer lemons made my entire apartment smell wonderful, and the finished cake fragrance was a nice sequel.
It's hard to improve upon a lushly lemony pound cake like this, especially with the lemon syrup soaked into the exterior. Few things pair better with some green tea and a quiet afternoon.
