Lemon Torte

I have been craving lemon poppy seed cake…

…so when my friend’s mom, Rosco, gave me a bag of Meyer lemons from the tree in their backyard, I was more than anxious to get home to my cookbooks…

Rosco is so loving and generous and insisted that I take home with a bag full of lemons. This recipe only takes 4 lemons and I can not wait to try more recipes with the remaining 20 something lemons!
Serve along side bowls of whipped cream and fresh berries. Simply whip heavy cream with a little sugar and lemon zest. I used one of those little hand held, battery operated, frothers that are used for milk in your coffee. Light and easy to transport to a friends house and simple to clean.

I’d hardly say I adapted the recipe from Miss Dahl’s Voluptuous Delights Cookbook…
I changed it around to make it a bit healthier (in my opinion) and ended up with extra batter. This actually worked out for the better. I filled 2 little dishes with the remaining batter and was able to enjoy a sample size for myself before bringing the torte to a friend’s house the following day. It would have been painfully difficult to look at this torte on my counter for a day and not be able to try it!

I substituted honey for sugar. 1 cup for 1 cup is the same in recipes. Though, you want to pay attention while baking that it does not brown too quickly (honey will do that). Also, I added a 1/4 t of baking soda to neutralize the acidity from the honey

Ingredients:
1 1/2 sticks butter
1 cup honey
6 eggs separated
3 lemons, zest and juice (3/4 cup juice)
2 cups blanched almonds, ground
1 cup cornmeal
1/4 baking soda

Preheat 400
Grease and flour a 9 inch springform pan

Combine the dry ingredients in a bowl and set aside

Cream the butter and honey

Add egg yolks one at a time, while dropping the whites into a separate large bowl
Whisk the egg whites until soft peaks form
Add to the butter mixture
Fold the dry mixture into the wet mixture with a spatula
Bake in the oven for 10 minutes
(with a cookie sheet on the rack below incase batter drips through the springform pan)
Turn the oven down to 285 and cook for another 40 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean.

When using honey instead of refind sugar you need to adjust cooking times and temps.
If you use sugar:
bake at 300, not 285
bake for 40 minutes not 35
you will not use baking soda

cornmeal gives this a nice texture and makes this gluten free

Cool completely on a rack before removing it from the tort pan