Lemon Loaf

Lemon is a refreshing aroma and taste of the season.

Finding a good recipe using lemon the flavor takes patience and means often making many samples. Sometimes the origin of a good recipe may be a decrepit piece of scrap paper, battered, splattered and stained. Or it could be found in a repertoire of Martha Stewart’s array of cookbooks and magazines. I stumbled upon this one in one of my many cookbooks.

This Lemon Loaf is a favorite of our family; the pungent aroma and taste of fresh lemons delight the palate.

Baking the batter in four small pans instead of two large ones allows us to enjoy fresh loaves from the freezer on an ongoing basis. These smaller loaves make an excellent hostess gift for those of us who don’t bake and they can be used as a sweet treat at teatime.

Although, I normally use only butter in most of my baking, I do look for ways to make desserts lighter. Yogurt mixed with vegetable oil makes a healthy moist product and you don’t even need an electric mixer to make this loaf. As they cool on the wire baking rack, glaze them with sweetened fresh lemon juice. After removing them from the pans, drizzle thin lemon icing over the loaves. This final touch makes them almost too good looking to cut into. This recipe is not in the cookbook - From Oma's Kitchen.

3 cups/ 750ml regular flour

4 tsp/ 20ml baking powder

1 tsp / 5ml salt

2 cups/ 500ml plain vanilla yogurt

2 cups/ 500ml sugar

6 large eggs

1 Tbsp/ 15ml grated lemon zest (~ 2 lemons)

1 tsp/ 5ml pure vanilla extract

1 cup/ 250ml vegetable oil

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Glaze: 1/3 cup/ 75ml lemon juice, freshly squeezed

1/3 cup/ 75ml sugar

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Thin Icing: 1 cup/ 250ml icing sugar

3 Tbsp/ 45ml lemon juice

Method: Preheat oven to 350F/ 180C.

Grease 4 small or 2 large loaf pans.

Into a medium sized bowl, sift together flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside. Into a large bowl, whisk together yogurt, sugar, eggs, lemon zest and vanilla. Slowly whisk the dry ingredients into the wet ones. With a spatula, fold vegetable oil into the batter, making sure it is all incorporated. (Be patient, it will become smooth) Pour batter into prepared pans and bake 45-50 min. or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. For large loaves, increase baking time.

Glaze: Microwave sugar and lemon juice together until sugar is dissolved. When loaves come out of oven, pour glaze over them.

Let stand for 10-15 minutes, remove from pans.

Combine icing sugar and lemon juice, pour over warm loaves.

Enjoy!!! These loaves freeze well.