Spring has come early with this LEMON-LIME LAYER CAKE – a beautiful layer lemon cake with lime buttercream!
I really can eat cake at any time of the day, month, or year. Making an excuse to bake and then eat cake is a talent of mine. Really, ask my kids. I could live off chocolate cake and I make a killer good one. But there are those moments where I cave to my husband’s dessert desires and make something with limes. His favorite cookies are my Key Lime Sugar Cookie and it is all because of the frosting. So I decided that I would make a cake just for him.
And let me tell you, friends, he would have had the entire cake if I wouldn’t have stopped him. We all needed some, you know. I already am looking forward to making this again once it becomes warm. And this will be an Easter must-have.
Limes just aren’t for limeade or margaritas they make amazing cakes, and well lemon is a bakers dream.
So whip up this easy, delicious, mouthwatering cake. It is simple to make and even easier to devour.
Ingredients
Lemon Cake:
- 1 cup 2 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature, plus more for pans
- 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour spooned and leveled, plus more for pans
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon lemon zest
- 1 1/2 cups sugar
- 2 large eggs plus 3 large egg yolks
- 1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
- 1 cup low-fat buttermilk
Lime Buttercream:
- 7-8 cups confectioners' sugar
- 2 limes juiced
- 6 tablespoons lime zest
- 1 cup butter softened to room temperature
- 8-10 tablespoons milk
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
- Lightly spray with baking oil and flour two 8-by-2-inch cake pans. Make sure to tap out the excess flour. In a bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and lemon zest.
- In a large bowl mixing bowl and using an electric mixer, or use your KitchenAid mixer like me, cream together butter and 1 1/2 cups sugar until light and fluffy. Reduce mixer speed to low and add in eggs and yolks, one at a time. Mix in lemon juice. Alternate adding in flour mixture and buttermilk beginning and ending with flour. Mix until well combined.
- Pour ½ of the batter into one pan and add the remaining to the second pan. Place in oven and bake for 30-35 minutes or until cake starts to pull away from the sides of the pan.
- Once cakes are completely cooked remove from the oven and cool. Allow the pans to cool for 10 minutes on a cake rack, then remove cakes from the pans and place back on cake rack, allowing them to completely cool.
- While the cakes are cooling, make lime buttercream. In a large bowl, cream together the confectioners' sugar and butter until smooth. Gradually mix in the milk, lime zest and juice with an electric mixer until smooth and stiff, about 5 minutes. Color with food coloring if desired.
- *2 Layer Cake -* Evenly spread the filling on top of the bottom layer, then add the second cake on top.
Kelly says
Is there a way I can lessen the amount of icing sugar to just half. It seems like a lot of icing sugar. I’d rather do something different but with the same lime flavouring. Any suggestions?
Ya says
Perfect cake. I make cup cakes too with the same batter. Also I add 1c strawberries and make strawberry cake. Excellent. Thanks
Julie @Real Housemoms says
Adding strawberries sounds delicious!
BETTY BRUSCA says
I am making this TODAY!!!!
Sandra McC says
So excited for you! Enjoy!
Kate says
I just made this cake for my sister when she came home from college, and it’s delicious! It’s so very sweet, so I’ll cut it in smaller slices the next time we serve it. I think I must have done something wrong with the icing… it was a bit too runny, even after adding as much confectioners sugar as I dared to. It didn’t really taste like good butter cream, and I also put it on the cakes while they were still warm… how silly of me- I must not have been thinking! It melted a lot, in addition to being too runny in the first place. But the recipe is delicious! Just don’t make my mistakes! I fixed the look of the icing by piping some pink icing from an aerosol can of it that i had- it was a beautiful color combination!
Jamie says
This is one of the best cakes I have ever made. I used the measurements that were written (didn’t realize there was a typo) and it turned out fantastic. The cake was moist and light and the buttercream frosting was delicious. I recommend this to anyone. I was super easy to make too.
Jeanne Guy says
Can this recipe be converted to a 9 x 13 sheet cake? If so, any changes to ingredients quantity? What would baking time and temp be?
Can’t wait to taste this cake.
Thanks for your help in converting this recipe.
Tymanda says
Looks delicious! Is it dense enough to be covered in fondant and/or used when stacking cakes? Thank you.
Liz says
Looks and sounds so good. Thank you and have a great weekend!
Eydie says
The directions for this cake are off. It calls for 2.5 cups sugar and says to add 1.5 cups then it says to have 1.4c lemon juice plus 2 T. and then says to add 4 T. to recipe. So are they typos or what. Thanks am trying to make for company tomorrow.
Julie @Real Housemoms says
Hi Eydie, the ingredients do call for 1.5 cups of sugar as do the directions. The extra 2 tablespoons of lemon juice in the ingredients is a typo (we corrected it) and we apologize for that. However, 1/4 cup = 4 tablespoons and the amount of juice to use, listed in the directions, is correct.
Kelly S says
This looks like a delicious recipe. I didn’t notice in the recipe directions, but may have missed it. Where are the sliced lemons used?
Julie @Real Housemoms says
Hi Kelly! The lemon slices are an optional garnish to the top of the cake. You can use them fresh or candied. Sorry about the confusion. We’ve updated the recipe. 🙂