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This week’s Tuesday with Dorie is French Yogurt Cake and was chosen by Liliana of My Cookbook Addiction. Yay Liliana, excellent choice. Yogurt cakes are one of my favorite things to bake, mainly because they are so moist and tasty but not full of saturated fat. I heart low fat baking as it allows me to indulge without gaining a bajillion pounds. (Something else that helps me on the weeks when TWD is a saturated fat party is Ellie Krieger - you should check it out if you are interested in good healthy recipes).

Anyway, this cake fit in perfectly with my ode to the lemon this week (check out my other lemon week posts so far: Lemon Poppyseed Muffins, Lemon Blueberry Souffle Pancakes, Whole Lemon Tart & Pasta Frolla Dough). It is a yogurt cake flavored with lemon and almonds. One of my favorite cakes of all time is Ina Garten’s Lemon Yogurt Cake. Ina’s cake is sweet, moist, and bright, so this yogurt cake had some large shoes to fill. Overall, I think this French yogurt cake got the job done. It had a wonderfully nutty flavor with a nice background hint of lemon. I actually added some almond extract to the cake, which strengthened the nuttiness, and I also served it with some almond pastry cream we had left over from Nick’s first foray into Danish, which you should look for next week. (They were unbelievable). Since I accentuated the almond flavor I also zested 2 lemons in this cake instead of just the one the recipe calls for, because I still wanted the citrus to shine through the nut. Which it did.

The final consensus is that my beloved lemon yogurt cake still has my heart and I prefer it over Dorie’s nuttier cake. That said, I will definitely keep this cake in my repertoire when I am in the mood for something nutty versus something with more citrus flavor. It is a beautiful light cake that is perfect with a nice hot cup of coffee or tea.

Follow up:

Here is the recipe with my adaptations:

Almond Lemon Yogurt Cake
Original recipe by Dorie Greenspan, adapted by Sara at imafoodblog.com

• 1 cup all purpose flour
• 1/2 cup ground almonds
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup sugar
• grated zest of 2 lemons
• 6 oz non fat vanilla yogurt
• 3 eggs
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 teaspoon almond extract
• 1/2 cup canola oil

1. Center a rack in the oven and preheat to 350F. Spray a 8 1/2 x 4 1/4 x 2 1/2 inch loaf pan with non stick spray, line the bottom with parchment paper (spray top of parchment paper too) and flour the pan.
2. In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, ground almonds, baking powder, and salt.
3. Put sugar and lemon zest in a medium bowl and smoosh together with your fingers until the sugar is moist and the aroma of the lemon is strong.
4. To the sugar mixture, add the yogurt, eggs, vanilla extract, and almond extract and whisk until well combined.
5. While still whisking, add in the dry ingredients. Then switch to a rubber spatula and fold in the canola oil. Don’t over mix here, but make sure that the oil is fully incorporated.
6. Pour batter into your loaf pan and bake for 50-55 minutes or until a cake tester in the center comes out dry. If the cake looks like it is browning too fast, cover it with aluminum foil.
7. Allow the cake to cool for about 5 minutes, then carefully remove from the pan and allow to come to room temperature on a wire rack. If the cake is too brown on the sides (which I felt mine were), just use a serrated knife to cut off the edges.
8. To serve, the possibilities are endless for what you could spread on this cake: jams, curds, pastry creams, glazes, icings, or all by it’s lonesome. It will be delicious whatever you choose.

You can see here that I cut off the sides of my cake, and I actually think it looks pretty nice like that with the crumbly cake exposed.

The almond pastry cream, sprinkled with a few blanched almonds, was a perfect accompaniment to this cake. However. after eating more of it the next day I actually liked it better plain.