Lemon Greek Yogurt Pound Cake
Attention Lemon Lovers! This blog is my personal family recipe book. It’s the thing I can someday pass to my kids as a reference for all the recipes they loved of mine. If this is your first time visiting you may want to check out some classics: Chocolate Chip Cookies, The Best Banana Bread Ever, Chocolate Cake etc.
This Lemon Pound Cake Recipe is an easy recipe that is essential for any home baker. Easy, classic, SO good. It is full of fresh ingredients like lemon zest, freshly squeezed lemon juice, & creamy greek yogurt. The lemon glaze on top seals in the moisture and adds a bright lemon flavor. If you love lemon desserts or lemon recipes in general I really suggest you check this one out! This is a classic pound cake recipe every home baker should have in their bag of tricks!
Qualities I look for in a Lemon Pound Cake Recipe:
- The opposite of dry, (you know the word I’m trying to avoid here….)
- Full of bright, juicy, lemon flavor from fresh lemons. (The best way to get lemon juice and lemon zest!)
- Easy and simple using common ingredients
This lemon cake is super lemon-y, and the addition of yogurt makes it just over-the top good. The texture is unreal. On it’s own, the cake isn’t actually overly sweet, but I drenched it in a lemon syrup over the entire cake and then a lemon glaze on top of that. Trust me- the combo of both is to die for. Can you tell I love this cake!?
Why is this such a moist pound cake? (Sorry I had to say the m word.)
- Poking holes into the top of the cake with a fork or skewer all over right when it’s warm for maximum syrup absorption.
- The sweet/tart lemon simple syrup which you drench the cake with- infusing it with lemon flavor and the perfect texture.
- Lemon glaze that dries hard while you let the cake cool and seals the cake- keeping the moisture inside.
- Adding the lemon zest to the sugar and mixing it a bit really releases the lemon flavors and helps them pop!
Ingredients needed for a Moist Lemon Pound Cake:
- Fresh Lemon Juice
- Lemon Zest
- Greek Yogurt
- Sugar
- Room temperature eggs
- All purpose Flour
- Baking Powder
- Salt
- Unsalted Butter
- Powdered Sugar for the glaze
- Vanilla Extract
Ingredient Substitutes:
- For Greek Yogurt: You can 100% use sour cream, regular yogurt, or buttermilk in place of the Greek Yogurt. I have made this with all those options and it has still turned out great
- For the Lemon Juice/ Lemon zest: This cake is also fabulous with lime juice and zest. I haven’t yet tried it with sweeter citrus like oranges but I have no doubt it would turn out well too! You could also use a smaller amount of lemon extract to get a similar lemon-y flavor.
Supplies Needed for this Lemon Pound Cake Recipe:
- Large Bowl for mixing the cake batter
- Hand mixer (or stand mixer!)
- Rubber spatula for cleaning the sides of the bowl.
- Medium Bowl for dry ingredients or flour mixture
- Small bowl for glaze.
- Small saucepan for making syrup
- Bowl for glaze
- Citrus Juicer
- Loaf Pan
- Plastic Wrap or an Airtight container for easy storage
- Wire Rack for cooling
- Cake tester (or toothpick) to check when loaf is done
- Measuring cup and spoons
- Nonstick cooking spray or butter to grease pans
Lemon Greek Yogurt Pound Cake
The perfect lemon cake every home baker needs in their recipe collection!
Ingredients
- 1½ cups all-purpose flour (180g)
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened at room temperature
- 1 cup sugar, (200g) plus ⅓ cup (67 g) for glaze
- zest of two lemons
- 4 eggs- room temperature
- 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- ¼ cup lemon juice for cake (2 oz) , plus ⅓ cup (2.6 oz) for syrup and 2 tablespoon for glaze
- ½ cup greek yogurt (143 g)
- ½ cup powdered sugar (50g)
Instructions
- In a small bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment (or you can use a hand mixer,) cream the butter, lemon zest and cup of the sugar until smooth.
- Add the eggs one and a time followed by the vanilla.Slowly add the dry ingredients and mix until almost combined. Fold in the lemon juice and yogurt, finish mixing on low until combined. (Batter won't be perfectly smooth but that's Ok.)
- Pour batter into a buttered/floured 9 inch loaf pan. Bake at 325F for 60-70 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.
- For the Syrup:
Stir together ⅓ cup of lemon juice and ⅓ cup sugar until sugar has dissolved. - For the Glaze:
Gradually add the lemon juice to the powdered sugar until desired drizzling consistency is reached. Add more juice/sugar as needed until it's as thick as you like. - To Finish:
Turn the warm cake onto a wire rack and poke all over with a fork or skewer. Brush generously with the lemon syrup. (Do this when the cake is still warm!) Pour the glaze over the top. Serve warm or room temperature.
Notes
Recipe adapted from The Food Network
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This sounds amazing, especially with that syrup AND glaze! OMG, lemon heaven. Gotta bake this one up and share with my lemon-loving mom, she’ll be in heaven! Pinned :)
Your baking/cooking always looks amazing! Beautiful photography. What do you do with all these goodies. You can’t possibly eat it all and stay so thin!
so so beautiful audra. i brought back 10 meyer lemons from my sis in law’s tree…..i’m tempted to make a few of these loaves with that! can’t wait to see you in person by the way!
so so beautiful audra. i brought back 10 meyer lemons from my sis in law’s tree…..i’m tempted to make a few of these loaves with that! can’t wait to see you in person by the way!
Pound cakes like this make my heart beat faster. I just love a good cake that is made simply like this!
Happy 2015, Audra. Hope you and the fam had a wonderful Christmas and New Year.
Healthier desserts? What are those? :lol: But in all honesty, this looks like it tastes phenomenal. Bring on the pound cake fest!
I love anything lemon-y so you can bet this loaf drenched in lemon syrup and then finished with lemon glaze looks like a dream come true to me!
xo, Elisa
I always have room for dessert, especially if we’re talking something sweet-tart and ultra lemony! This sounds great to me.
I make something similar with pistachios in a bundt – the lemon is so so lovely and the yogurt does this great thing for the density of the cake. One bowl baking is THE bestest.
Looks and sounds divine….I have this in the oven right now! Just wondering, are the lemon juice and sugar for the syrup supposed to be boiled/heated?
You know I didn’t do that. You can though!
This looks fabulous!! I love lemon flavored desserts.
I just baked it this morning and it is soooooo good!!!!!! Thank you so much for sharing such amazing yet simple receipes!!!! I only had almond greek yogurt in my fridge but it worked just fine as well :-)
This looks divine!!!
I made this yesterday for my Valentine Day dessert because my mom loves lemon. She adored it. I did heat the syrup to dissolve the sugar. I also added a drop of lemon extract to the glaze to amp up the lemon flavor since there wasn’t rind in the glaze. I would definitely make this again.
This was so good. It’s almost like a lemon square in cake form. I made it for the people at work and they loved it. I halved the recipe using a mini-loaf pan and added vanilla bean to the glaze. Perfection!
Made this on Sunday. Mid-way through the recipe I realized I actually DIDN’T have any Greek yogurt and I only had 3 eggs. I subbed heavy cream and kept it at 3 eggs…easily the best lemon pound cake I’ve ever had. And I didn’t even put syrup or glaze on it. Omg must make again.
Could you make this in a bundt plan?
Yes I don’t see why not!
Thank you for this recipe. I tried it yesterday. It makes a lovely lemony pound cake.
I needed 4 lemons in total for the lemon juice in the batter, syrup, and glaze. One individual yogurt cup (5.3 oz net weight) contains slightly more than the 1/2 cup of yogurt that the recipe specifies.
Hi! Salted or unsalted butter?
Always unsalted!
Can I replace the all purpose flour with self-raising one? (As this is what I have at the moment) & if I do that do I still use the baking powder?
They all look delicious, is going to be hard which one to pick first!
My Greek yogurt is 2%. Do you think that’s enough fat to create a tender loaf? Or should I try to find one higher in fat?
This looks so good! Can I use sour cream instead of yogurt?
Thanks for sharing! Does it keep long?
This was really delicious! I’m going to make it again
Can I substitute butter with sunflower oil?
Do you think I could use gluten free flour for this recipe
Sure I think that would work!
I love this recipe!! I am a huge fan of all things lemon, so this is right up my alley. I’m thinking about making it this weekend for my friends. Quick question, though: Is it ok to not add lemon zest? I just think my friend wouldn’t like it as much. Anyway, would definitely recommend this to anyone looking for something to brighten their day!!
Sure you can skip the lemon zest.