Flourless Lemon-Almond Cake

What's the occasion? Spreading lemon-scented sunshine on Passover & Easter.

If Claudia Roden’s Orange and Almond Cake and Niloufer Ichaporia King’s Cardamom Cake had a baby—who inherited none of its parents’ cardamom or orange genes, but instead shined bright with lemon—it would look like this zingy, fragrant flourless (and vegan) dessert.

So how is this baby related to its progenitors? Well, I borrowed Roden’s technique of boiling whole citrus fruit and blending it with almond flour, and King’s method for creating a crackling slivered-almond-and-sugar crust. The resulting confection has a rich, fudgy, zest-flecked interior and a delightfully textural top. This intensely lemony cake is elevated enough for Passover and Easter but easy enough to whip up on a whim any day of the week. After boiling the lemons, the rest of the prep takes mere minutes.

Flourless Lemon-Almond Cake

To achieve the right texture with the sugar-almond crust, don’t let the cake cool in the pan for more than about five minutes, or the continued heat will caramelize the sugar and the top will become a bit chewy. That’s not a disaster, but you’ll lose out on one of the things that makes this cake distinctive. One irony is that the interior of the cake is even better the second day, but the top loses some of its crackle. I wouldn’t worry about it—it’s excellent then too.

Makes one 9-inch round cake

• 2 big juicy lemons, preferably organic and unwaxed (otherwise well scrubbed)

• 1 tablespoon neutral oil such as safflower

• 3 tablespoons plus 1 scant cup¹ (200 grams) granulated sugar

• 3 tablespoons slivered almonds

• 3 eggs

• ⅓ cup olive oil

• 1¾ cup (200 grams) almond flour/meal

• Generous pinch of salt

• 1½ teaspoons baking powder

• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract or paste

1. Place lemons in a medium pot and cover with water. Bring to a boil, lower heat, and simmer gently, uncovered, until soft but still in tact, 50 minutes to an hour, dependiing on your lemons. (Thickness of skin and size of fruit varies widely.) Remove them if they start to split.

2. Meanwhile, spray or brush bottom and sides of a 9-inch springform pan liberally with neutral oil, line it with a circle of parchment paper, and brush or spray that too. Add 3 tablespoons sugar, swirling it around the bottom and part-way up the sides of the pan (about 1½ inches, but you don’t have to be fussy) until evenly coated. Sprinkle almonds over the sugar and set pan aside. Here’s what that looks like:

   

3. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Remove lemons from pot with a slotted spoon and run under cold water for 30 seconds, then cut in half crosswise (over a plate to catch any juice) and remove seeds. Place lemons and any stray juice in the bowl of a food processor, along with the remaining ingredients. Process for about 90 seconds, stopping once to scrape down the sides.

4. Pour or spoon large dollops of batter over the almonds in the prepared pan, then smooth the top with a rubber spatula. Rap the pan on the counter once or twice to remove any air bubbles.

5. Bake on center rack for about 45 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean. Cool in pan for 5 minutes, then run a sharp knife around the edges of the cake and remove sides of springform pan. Tip cake, bottom side up, onto a cake plate², peeling off parchment if necessary. Serve with whipped cream if desired.

1. No need to be precise, but 200 grams is more like a cup minus 1–2 tablespoons, and you may want to reduce the sugar a bit in any case.

2. Normally I’d say to tip onto a rack to cool, but this cake will be hard to transfer to a cake plate later and doesn’t seem to suffer from cooling on the plate.