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My homemade Lemon Pound Cake with Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting is dense yet moist – and bursting with flavor!
Lemon Pound Cake Recipe
A reader recently asked me if she could easily turn my lemon cupcakes into a pound cake. Sadly, the answer was no. But lucky for us, that’s not the end of this story! Because I couldn’t get lemon pound cake out of my head! So I did what I do best: I tested and tweaked until finally: the perfect lemon pound cake with Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting was born!
This luscious loaf is moist, sweet, and perfectly lemony. I absolutely love it with a cup of coffee in the morning! But if cake for breakfast isn’t your thing (???), it’s equally amazing for dessert! You could even top if with a scoop of ice cream. I have!
Tips and Tricks for Recipe Success:
- Because we want a dense and moist crumb, cake flour is used in this recipe. You can find this ingredient in most grocery stores, or buy it online here.
- To achieve the best lemon flavor, you will use a combination of fresh lemon juice, lemon zest, and lemon extract. Because they all play different roles in developing the final flavor of the cake, I do not suggest skipping or substituting any of them.
- I find this pound cake is best eaten within two days of being made, but can be tightly wrapped and stored in the fridge for up to 3 days. I suggest bringing it to room temperature before serving it.
We brought this to a picnic last weekend and it was a huge hit with our friends and family! So if you’re a lemon lover and you’ve been searching for the perfect pound cake recipe, give this one a try SOON.
If you try this recipe for Lemon Raspberry Pound Cake, let me know! Leave a comment below and don’t forget to snap a pic and tag it #bakerbynature on instagram! Seeing your kitchen creations makes my day
More Lemon Cakes:
Lemon Pound Cake with Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting
Ingredients
For the Lemon Pound Cake:
- 1 cup (8 ounces) unsalted butter
- 1 cup (7 ounces) granulated sugar
- 1/4 cup (1 and 3/4 ounces) light brown sugar, packed
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 1 teaspoon pure lemon extract
- 2 tablespoons lemon zest
- 1 tablespoons lemon juice
- 4 large eggs plus 2 egg yolks
- 1 and 3/4 cups (7 ounces) cake flour
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
For the Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting:
- (1) 8 ounce block full-fat cream cheese, VERY soft but not melted
- 1/4 cup (2 ounces) unsalted butter, VERY soft but not melted
- 1/4 teaspoon pure lemon extract
- 2 cups (8 ounces) confectioners' sugar, sifted (more if needed)
Instructions
For the Lemon Pound Cake:
- Adjust an oven rack to middle position, then preheat oven to 375 degrees (F). Spray a 9x5 inch loaf pan with non-stick baking spray; set aside.
- Melt the butter in a small saucepan over medium heat. Pour melted butter into a large bowl, then whisk in both sugars. Add in vanilla extract, lemon extract, lemon zest, and lemon juice and beat well. Add in the eggs and yolks, one at a time, beating well after each addition.
- In a separate medium-sized bowl combine the cake flour, salt, and baking powder. Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and gently whisk together until just combined.
- Pour batter into prepared pan and smooth the top with a rubber spatula. Bake for 20 minutes, then reduce oven temperature to 325 degrees and continue baking for about 40 minutes, or until the top is golden brown and a cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool cake in the pan for 15 minutes before transferring it to a cooling rack to cool completely (about 1 hour).
For the Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting:
- In the bowl of a stand-mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, or in a large bowl using an electric handheld mixer, beat the cream cheese, butter, and lemon extract on medium-high speed until completely smooth; about 2 minutes. Reduce the speed to low and gradually add the sifted confectioners' sugar. Once all of the sugar has been added beat on high-speed for 1-2 minutes. If the frosting appears too thin, add a little more confectioners' sugar, 1/4 cup at a time. Once the cake has completely cooled, spread the frosting over the top of cake and decorate with lemon slices, if desired. Slice and serve! Store this cake in the fridge, covered, for up to 3 days.
I’m a self confessed PIE ADDICT but this looks beyond amazing?! I love pound cake but I think the Lemon Cream Cheese frosting is what makes me weak at the knees! Wonderfully made!
I love pound cake! This ones looks like it tastes fabulous!
This recipe reminds me of an older one my grandma used to make when I was just a kid. Also, everything related to lemon is perfect for me these days, when the temperatures are ridiculously high. I can just imagine how great this pound cake tastes after keeping it a bit in the frigde…
Looks so delicious! I cannot keep my mouth shut! Slurp! slurp! I am gonna make this myself!
Love anything lemon!!
I am loving that you paired the cream cheese frosting with this recipe–so yum!
The lemon pound cake by itself sounds amazing! But you took it up a notch with the cream cheese frosting! Yum!
I wish I had this for my snack today!
I am in love with this cake. I love the combination of Lemon Pound Cake with Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting. This cake is really a star of any get together at least at my home.. I am going to make this. Its one hell delicious cake. Thank you for the recipe.
Unfortunately, mine was on the dry side. I guess I overbaked it even though I didn’t even bake it as long as the recipe stated. The icing is delicious though.
REVIEW
I really liked this recipe! I added an extra tablespoon or so of lemon juice to the batter, and 1/2 teaspoon (instead of 1/4) of lemon extract into the icing, because it didn’t seem lemony enough!
This cake is dense and moist the way a pound cake should be, and delicious! I couldn’t place where I had tasted it before. Suddenly it hit me. When I was a little girl, I’d sprinkle sugar all over my pancakes then squeeze a lemon over it, and this cake tastes exactly like that!
Also, I found I only used about HALF the icing that this recipe made. The cake itself is very sweet already, so you could easily half the icing recipe.
Hello. I just had a piece of my Lemon Pound Cake . It is delicious as is the Cream Cheese Frosting. The cake seemed a little too moist and I continued to cook it and almost then overcooked it. I baked my cake in in a glass loaf pan. What kind of pan do you use for this Lemon Pound Cake?
Than you for the recipe.
Hi this sounds really good! Would it work in a bundt cake pan as well?
Or would I need to adjust the baking time?
Thanks! 🙂
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Hi! This looks delicious! Can you make cake flour at home by adding cornstarch? This saves me from making another trip to the store and buying additional types of flour. Thanks!
This was the first recipe i tried of your blog and everyone who got a piece of it – including me- was blown away by the result! Probably the most delicious cake i ever baked!
As soon as I saw your photos I had to make this. I followed everything in the recipe. I did add a little zest to the frosting. It’s delicious. It actually tastes like I purchased at a bakery. Firm but moist and the frosting is light tasting too. Thank you! I will be making this again.
Fabulous! Most lemon pound cakes call for a frosting (drizzle) of powdered sugar and lemon juice. It is simply too tart. This cream cheese is so refined and delicious. I did add a touch more lemon extract and more powdered sugar to get the consistency I wanted.
I made this today – a perfect lemon cake! It was so easy to put together and looked just like the photo. The best part is the cream cheese frosting which makes this cake different from the usual lemon cakes.
If you like lemon you will love this cake. Great bake, frosting is delicious! I highly recommend. Came out great. used more lemon juice in batter and more extract in frosting along with lemon zest.
Flavor was yummy. But a little to dense and dry. Baked for 20 minutes, then reduce oven temperature to 325 degrees and continue baking for about 32 minutes, (but looked done at about 20 minutes in).
7 ounces of cake flour was more like 1 1/2 cups ?
My review is for the frosting, I made the cream cheese frosting for my gluten free mix pound cake and it was delicious.
TOO MANY reviewers here did not even bake anything in this recipe, how on earth can they give a 5 star review? They shouldn’t do that, it skews the true rating for the recipe.