I am in such an odd mood today. I don't know what's wrong with me but the house doesn't feel clean enough, I'm very unsettled and I can't seem to focus my attention to anything for more than 10 minutes.
I'm wondering is it a sign that baby is on the way. I was getting a lot of cramps last night and a bath didn't give me much ease but they tailed off before bed and bar a few that woke me in the night I haven't really had any today yet.
We did get a minor fright at my 38 week Midwife check yesterday when she couldn't tell if baby was head down or not so we were sent off to Harrogate for a quick scan (and by quick I mean quick!). We were in and out of that room in under a minute as they just squeezed us in between appointments. Thankfully baby's head is fully engaged so now it's just a waiting game to see when he will arrive.
In the meantime I'm trying to distract my easily distracted mind by keeping myself busy. Yesterday I cleared out the big camera and realised I hadn't blogged about this Lemon Meringue Cake that I made for my baby shower two weeks ago.
I was sent some Mercers Lemon Cheese Curd and some Red Onion Marmalade from the folks at the BBC Good Food Show and decided my baby shower was a perfect excuse to try out the lemon curd in a cake.
I knew I wanted to make something quick and easy, my parents were over visiting that weekend too and I didn't want to be holed up in the kitchen baking when I could be spending time with them. I remembered seeing a lemon meringue recipe in The Clandestine Cake Club Book (pg148) and after a quick read I knew it would be ideal - not too much faff but yummy and indulgent at the same time.
I did swap the icing for buttercream as I loathe cream cheese icing and it meant I didn't need to refrigerate the cake either. The curd was delicious and I'm sad I only got a small pot of it to try out, I could easily have used a lot more in the filling!
Lemon Meringue Cake
200g softened unsalted butter
200g caster sugar
3 eggs
250g SR flour
2 tbsp lemon curd
3 tbsp milk
Meringue
3 egg whites
170g caster sugar
Filling
100g softened unsalted butter
250g icing sugar (I used Sugar and Crumbs Lemon Drizzle flavour)
Juice of 1 lemon if not using flavoured sugar
Lots of lemon curd!
- Preheat the oven to 160C (fan)
- Grease and line two 20cm cake tins
- Cream the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy
- Alternate between adding the eggs and flour to prevent curdling
- Mix in the lemon curd and milk
- Divide the mixture between the 2 tins and bake in the oven for 20 minutes
- While the cake is baking, make the meringue.
- Whisk the egg whites until stiff then add the sugar a teaspoon at a time until glossy and firm.
- Remove the sponges from the oven, and divide the mixture between the two cake tins.
- Bake in the oven for a further 10 minutes until the meringue starts to turn golden on top.
- Leave to cool in the tin for 10 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack.
- To make the filling beat the butter and icing sugar on a high speed until pale, fluffy and mousse like.
- Add a few drops of milk if needed to loosen it.
- Gently spread over the top of one of the meringues and follow with the lemon curd.
- Place the second cake layer on top.
Enjoy!
***Lemon curd was send for review but all thoughts are my own.***
2 comments
I bought some of this to add to a cake, but I had to go to the shop twice to buy it. I am still pretty grossed out at the idea of Lemon Cheese. Tasted nice though but I hate the name.
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