Easy Lemon Cake In One Bowl
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An easy to make, super-lemony and moist cake you can mix up in one bowl without an electric mixer! This snack or tea cake is gluten-free, dairy-free and has a satisfying rustic crunch from cornmeal and pine nuts.
When you want to make an easy lemon cake without fussing around, this one is for you! This recipe whip ups in 10 minutes, using just one bowl — no mixer, no need to soften butter (there’s no dairy at all) and no wheat flour in sight.
I find this cake tastes so good it’s really hard to have just one slice. Okay, let’s be real — when I make this cake we often don’t even bother to slice it!
This cake is definitely more humble-looking than other cakes. What it lacks in the beauty department is paid back a thousand times in taste and texture, and it’s perfect for all your casual cake needs.
Rustic Italian-style cakes are my thing, starting with my go-to lemon polenta cake, another cake recipe that my readers rave about.
How I measure baking ingredients
I develop recipes professionally, so I rely on an inexpensive digital scale to get accurate measurements. I appreciate that a lot of large mainstream sites like New York Times Cooking have started to include metric conversions in their recipes. This is the scale I use.
You certainly don’t need to run out and get one to make this cake. But if you do a lot of baking I cannot recommend a digital scale enough! It will change how you bake without having to rely on measuring cups, which are notoriously different from brand to brand.
Easy One Bowl Lemon Cake
Ingredients
- ¾ cup pine nuts or ½ cup sliced almonds
- ¾ cup (150 g) granulated sugar
- 1 lemon
- 3 large eggs
- ½ cup (125 ml) extra virgin olive oil
- 1 teaspoon almond extract
- 1 ½ cups (165 g) fine blanched almond flour
- ½ cup (70 6) fine yellow cornmeal
- 1 tablespoon (15 g) cornstarch
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt or ½ teaspoon fine sea salt
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 (175 C) degrees. Spray an 8-inch round or square cake pan with cooking spray and line the bottom with a piece of parchment.
- Arrange the pine nuts evenly over the bottom of the pan and sprinkle with 2 tablespoons of the sugar.
- Grate the lemon over a large bowl to remove all the zest. Crack 3 large eggs into the bowl along with the remaining 120 grams sugar. Whisk until the mixture looks pale and creamy. While whisking, pour ½ cup extra virgin olive oil and mix until emulsified. Stir in 1 teaspoon almond extract.
- Add 1 ½ cups fine blanched almond flour, ½ cup fine yellow cornmeal, 1 tablespoon cornstarch, 2 teaspoons baking powder 1 teaspoon kosher salt or ½ teaspoon fine sea salt. Stir with a wooden spoon or spatula until smooth. Scrape the batter over the pine nuts into the prepared cake pan.
- Bake 30-35 minutes, until the top feels springy and a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Cool the cake on a rack 15 minutes.
- Invert the cake onto a serving plate and serve warm or at room temperature.
Karen’s Notes and Tips
- The cake will keep covered at room temperature up to 3 days.
- Substitute sliced almonds for the pine nuts, or leave the nuts out completely.
- Try not to overbake to avoid burning the nuts.
- If you have lemon-infused olive oil, use it for a deeper lemon flavor!
Nutrition per serving
Nutrition facts are calculated by third-party software. If you have specific dietary needs, please refer to your favorite calculator.
Hey, I’m Karen
Creator of Familystyle Food
I’m a food obsessed super-taster and professionally trained cook ALL about creating elevated dinners with everyday ingredients. Find simplified recipes made from scratch and enjoy incredibly tasty food! Read more about me here.
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Excellent cake!! Perfect texture and lemon flavor. Will definitely make again!
Easy and delicious! Not too sweet. Have made it with pine nuts and almonds, we prefer it with almonds. Have made it with almond flour and with almond meal–the meal is a coarser texture but both are great. This will be my go to cake recipe and I have already shared it several times.