Angel Food Cake with Lemon Curd and Blueberries

Last summer we made this cake as Lily's birthday cake for a casual family picnic in the park with my in-laws and our family. Knowing Lily's love for lemons and Brad's dislike for overly sweet desserts (he's crazy, but I work with it), I decided to try an angel food cake with lemon curd instead of the classic birthday cake and butter cream frosting that I tend to use for birthdays. We loved this cake so much! It's been dubbed as Lily's birthday cake forever and she's requesting it for this summer's festivities already. Plus it's just a great summer cake because it's cool and refreshing and not too heavy. Top with seasonal blueberries and you're golden.

Lily did have a more kid-centric unicorn birthday cake for her same birthday only a few days prior because we were celebrating in PEI and also at home in Montreal. Writing this makes me realize that I haven't posted about PEI yet or that unicorn cake, so I promise I'll do that this week! But for now, here's the perfect June cake for you, for whatever or whomever you're celebrating!

Angel Food Cake

This cake uses no egg yolks, so has no fat. You'll use the yolks for the curd though, so don't throw them away! I don't have a tube pan which they say is required, but I just folded the cake batter into two regular 9 inch cake pans and layered the curd between each cake. Who wants more kitchen equipment than needed?

Ingredients

1 cup unbleached white flour
1 cup granulated sugar
8 large egg whites, room temperature
½ tsp cream of tartar
pinch salt
½ cup icing sugar
½ tsp vanilla extract

 

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 325ºF
2. Sift the flour and granulated sugar twice and set aside 
3. Whip the egg whites with the cream of tartar and salt until foamy, then gradually add the icing sugar, whipping until medium peaks form. 
4. Add in the vanilla.
5. Add the flour to the whipped whites slowly and using a whisk to fold in the flour evenly and easily. 
6. Scrape the batter into two 9 inch cake pans, spread it to level and bake the cake for 30-35 minutes, until it springs back when gently pressed (try not to open the oven before 25 minutes).
7. Turn the cake pan upside down to cool the cake, and do not remove the cake from the pan until completely cooled.I ran a knife around the edge of the cake to separate it from the pan.

Lemon Curd

I've shared this recipe before, using Meyer lemons and they are so good! This time I'm using regular lemons and it's still divine. I love curds of all kinds! You can always swap in some lime juice or even grapefruit juice, but classic lemon is best!

Ingredients

4 egg yolks
⅓ cup of sugar
zest from two lemons
⅓ cup of lemon juice
¼ cup of butter

Directions

1.  Warm everything but the butter on the stove top in a heavy bottomed pan, stirring constantly until it thickens (around 5-10 minutes).
2. Once thickened to the consistency of pudding, remove from heat and stir in butter.
3. Press through a fine mesh sieve into a glass bowl and top with plastic wrap (pressing the plastic wrap onto the very top f the curd so it doesn't get a film on top! - don't skip this step!)
4. Then let it cool in the fridge - this tastes best cold!

Enjoy!