Lemon Sour Cream Tea Cake - light and fluffy perfection

I can hardly believe that it's almost Christmas again.  It's been a pretty huge year for me on a few levels, so I'm quite happy and relieved that it's coming to an end so that I can refresh myself.

The things that have been baking in my house around Christmas are, as always, stacks of gingerbread (here's my recipe post from back in 2010!).  Mum and I have made close to ten gingerbread houses and so many cookies (mostly trees and reindeer); all the recipients of the cookies have been very appreciative.  I brought some in to my new workplace and that was a great conversation starter!

For Christmas day itself, we have a long lunch with our family and we're usually in charge of dessert.  This year, I'm making a mud cake and Mum will whip up some pavlovas in addition to a big gingerbread house.

If you're still looking for something to bake for Christmas (or just for general snacking!), I would highly recommend this lemon tea cake.  It's beautifully moist and fluffy, as well as nice and simple to make - and most importantly, it tastes divine.

Have a lovely holiday season, everyone, stay safe and eat lots of yummy food!

Recipe adapted from: The Australian Women's Weekly Cakes & Slices Cookbook
Ingredients (26 cm (10 inch) round cake - 1/2 a batch makes one 20 cm (8 inch) round cake)
250g butter
Zest of two lemons
500g caster sugar
6 eggs
350g flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
200g sour cream

Method
1. Preheat the oven to 170 C (340 F).  Grease a 27cm round tin with butter and line the bottom with baking paper.

2. Cream the butter, lemon zest and sugar until light and fluffy.  I use the whisk attachment on my Kitchenaid for every process in this cake.

3. Beat in the eggs one at a time.

4. Beat in half the sour cream, then half of the flour.

5. Beat in the remaining sour cream, then the remaining flour and the baking powder.  I use the whisk attachment on a low setting for this to ensure that everything is combined.

6. Spread the batter into your cake tin and bake for about 1 1/2 hours or until the top of the cake is golden and an inserted toothpick comes out with just a few crumbs.

7. Let the cake cool in the tin and then invert onto a wire rack or your desired serving plate.

8. To serve, you can simply dust the cake with icing sugar...

...or for a bit more flair, make up a glaze with lemon juice and icing sugar.  I recommend placing the cake on a wire rack and glazing it before transferring it to your serving plate so that the drippy glaze doesn't run everywhere.