A moist lemon coffee cake with a lemon crumble that is topped with a delicious sweet and tangy lemon cream. This cake screams spring and is the perfect treat to enjoy with your morning coffee or with your afternoon tea.
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LEMON EVERYTHING
Fun fact: I am not the biggest dessert fan! But if I am craving a dessert, I love to make a good simple cake, and coffees cake is exactly that – simple and so delicious. This Lemon Crumble Cake aka the perfect cake to welcome spring with is a balance of sweet and tangy, and who doesn’t love that! If you love lemon cakes, then you will love this cake.
Lemon in the cake batter, lemon in the crumble, and lemon in the cream. 🙂
Lemon Cake
The batter consistency is very similar to a coffee cake – not too loose or too thick. But the buttermilk and butter yield a richer and buttery crumb which is everything I love about a coffee cake. I flavored the batter with vanilla paste, lemon zest, and lemon juice. If you have lemon paste on hand, add that for even extra lemon flavor.
Let’s talk about that lemon cream!
Okay, I am sure others have tried this, but this lemon cream is the best thing I have tasted in a while. It is very simple – homemade whipped cream and store-bought lemon curd, that is it! I folded the lemon curd into the whipped cream in batches and tasted along the way until I reached my desired tangy and sweet. Very Simple but insanely good! If you make this cake, you have to make it with this lemon cream – A MUST!
Lemon Crumble Cake
Equipment
- You can use a 9 inch round cake pan or a springform cake pan
Ingredients
Lemon Cake
- 1 &3/4 cups All Purpose Flour
- 2 large eggs ( room temperature ) or 3 small eggs
- 3/4 cup buttermilk room temperature
- 1/4 cup lemon juice room temperature
- 4 tablespoons lemon zest
- 1/2 cup unsalted butter softened
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla paste or vanila extract
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
Lemon Crumble
- 2/3 cup All purpose flour
- 4&1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter cold butter cubed ( or melted butter , but please note in the instructions)
- zest of 1 large lemon
- 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
- 4 tablespoons sugar
- 2 tablespoons light brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon lemon juice
lemon Cream
- 1 &1/2 cups heavy whipping cream
- 5-6 tablespoons Store bought lemon curd
Instructions
Lemon Crumble
- Make the crumble first. In a medium bowl, mix together the flour, granulated sugar, baking powder, lemon zest, and brown sugar. Then, add the cubed cold butter and lemon juice and rub it into the flour and sugar mixture with your fingers. You want to combine it for a couple of minutes or until the butter is throughout all the flour/sugar. The texture should resemble a crumbly, wet sand consistency – Set aside. You can place the crumble in the refrigerator until ready to use. Once ready to use, using your clean fingers, crumble the mixture into very tiny pieces. Make sure the crumble pieces are not large because this will weigh down the cake and prevent it from rising properly in the oven.
- TIPS: Make sure you are pressing the cold butter really well into the flour and sugar. If you notice that your crumble is not crumbly after adding the butter, add a little additional sugar and flour until you get a crumbly mixture.Melted butter: If you want to add melted butter instead of cold butter cubes, make sure you place the crumble mixture in the fridge to set before using.
Lemon Cake
- Preheat Oven 350 F
- Make sure all your wet ingredients are at room temperature. This is very important!
- In a large bowl, beat together the butter and sugar until fluffy ( do not rush this process – this may take 3-4 minutes) Then beat in the eggs one at a time until each egg is fully incorporated. Then add the vanilla paste or extract and mix.
- Sir in the lemon juice and lemon zest. The batter may curdle, do not worry about that. Lemon juice causes that but the batter will return to a smooth consistency at the end.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt.
- Next, using an electric mixer on low speed, beat in about ½ of the flour mixture followed by about ½ of the buttermilk. Repeat with the rest of the flour and buttermilk. Try and begin with the flour and end with the flour. To avoid over-mixing the batter, I will fold in the flour at the end.
- Pour the batter into a round cake pan pan greased and lined with parchment paper. Smooth the cake batter and evenly sprinkle the crumble all over the cake batter. Make sure that you do not concentrate the crumble in the middle of the cake because that will weigh it down and the cake won't rise properly. Also, you do not have to use all the crumble.
- Place on the middle rack in the preheated oven and bake for about 38-40 minutes, or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean.
- Once baked, allow the cake to cool fully.
Lemon Cream
- In a large bowl using an electric mixer, whip the heavy cream until you get soft and semi stiff peaks.
- Fold in the lemon curd into the whipped cream. Taste and add additional lemon curd to your liking. Make sure to fold until it is creamy and lump free.
Notes
- I reduced the buttermilk from 1 cup to 3/4 cup which will help guarantee a lighter crumb.
- The original Crumble recipe called for ‘melted butter’ and that caused some issues for some, since the crumble needed to set in the fridge before using. The recipe has now been changed to use ‘cold butter’ and that should help get a better crumble consistency for everyone.
I will be sure to make this, looks amazing as a treat, its been such a long time.
Oh my goodness!!
Can’t wait to buy the ingredients and make this…
This looks absolutely divine 😍
In the oven right now. The house smells so amazing. Thank you for a great recipe
I made it and it’s super delicious, one of my new favorite .. thank you so much 😍🥰🥰
I made this today. It has to be the best cake I have ever made. I left out the crumble and realised just a plain lemon cake with some chocolate chips. The texture is heavenly. I have tried all sorts of recipes in an attempt to achieve the perfect moist crumble like texture but I was never fully satisfied with the outcome . I am so happy that I stumbled over your video on TikTok!! Thanks!
What if I don’t have/can’t find lemon curd but I really wanna make a similar cream 🙁
You can make your own lemon curd. There’s even a recipe for the microave. That’s what i plan to do
Hi!! The crumble seemed to have the right consistency, but would not crumble properly into tiny pieces like yours did even after I added a bit more flour? It ended up more doughy than it should’ve been. Do you have any suggestions for this? Thank you for the recipe!! 🙂
Hi Maya! Did you place the crumble in the fridge or freezer to set?
New family favourite! It disappeared very quickly, so delicious!
I literally have no idea what went wrong! I followed directions to a T! The only substitution was using salted butter and omitting the salt. The crumble seemed a little wet, so I added flour and it seemed fine. My goodness. The crumble completely disappeared or melted into the batter. The batter overflowed and burned to the bottom of the oven. And it seems gummy in the center despite baking it for 45+ minutes. Any ideas what possibly happened?!
Hi Kristen, so sorry to hear that the cake did not turn out the way it was supposed to. Based on what you have explained, there could be a lot of different reasons to why the cake did not turn out well. One, it looks like the cake pan you used was to small, since the batter overflowed. Two, the gummy center is most likely not the cake but the crumble that sunk into the batter. Also, in the recipe I make a note about placing the crumble in the fridge or freezer to set and then to use your… Read more »
Thanks for replying 🙂 It was a 9” pan, so I’m not sure what went wrong. The batter seemed to get kind of puffy almost. Maybe I added too much baking soda or something. The crumble was straight out of the fridge and I crumbled it in teeny tiny bits. I think the airy texture of the batter wasn’t enough to hold it up. Tastes good anyway 😉
I am going to make this tomorrow and I can’t wait! I am going to let it sit over night so that it is a birthday surprise for my friend in the morning. Would you recommend putting it in the fridge? Or just covering it and leaving it out? Thanks!
I plan on making this for Easter Lunch at my in-laws and I was wondering how long would the lemon cream hold in a container before it starts turning back into liquid? The cake won’r be served until after lunch 2-3 hrs after I arrive at their house. Thank you!
Hi!!
The cake looks really good. Can’t wait to try!!
Can I substitute lime for the lemons and if so how much?
Hi! yes, you can use lime instead of lemon 🙂
Made this cake yesterday for Easter dinner and sent some off to my grandparents for them to enjoy. Everyone LOVED it. I had a little issue with the crumble at first, but I think it was probably an error in my measurements, because the crumble mixture was a greasy blob. I remade it, this time adding the butter in portions until it was the consistency I knew it should be. It turned out amazingly. I did homemade curd as well because it seems like no one carries it here anymore. Super easy addition and had such amazing flavour. I’m already… Read more »
This is my second time making this cake and it never disappoints!! However, this second time around I added my own twist to it and made a raspberry filling and decorated as it was a b-day cake!!
The cake itself was amazing, not too sweet and well balanced (not too dry). Before decorating I let it chill and it held up very good during the decorating process!!
I am very happy with the final results, thanks figandoliveplatter!!! ❤
Sara! OMG, this looks incredible!! I love the combination of lemon and raspberry – Thanks for trying out the recipe 🙂
Make this cake!!!!! This may be one of the best cakes I have ever tasted. Extremely moist and light. The lemon curd in the whipped cream made it perfectly tangy-not overly sweet. I would recommend putting the crumble in the refrigerator to set and making sure it is super fine crumbles before putting on top as to not sink into the cake. It was SO good I made it two days in a row! I will definitely be making this cake very regularly.
This cake is amazing
Came out perfectly and the sponge is so soft and airy.
I’ll definitely make this again!
Thank you so much for this recipe.
Hey. I just found this recipe and am planning on making it. I have one question though – is the cake best eaten cold or warm? Or room temp? Considering there is a lemon cream, I’d expect it to be eaten cold or else the cream would melt and be too warm but I wouldn’t know. Thanks for making this recipe!
Hi! The cake is best enjoyed at room temperature 🙂
Hey! So I made this today and it tastes amazing, there was a problem with the crumple tho… it sinked! I thought I did it right, looks like I didn’t, do you have any idea of what I could’ve done wrong?
so delicious! i made without the whipped topping and put a basic icing instead and it was outstanding!!! highly recommend! for some reason this recipe made TWO 9 inch cakes which was amazing (and i used the regular recipe, probobly had to do with how i was folding in the baking soda, idk) ! great crowd pleaser at my party!
Ive made this recipe before I think last year it was soo good , but I wanted to to of i add frozen blueberries if it will still be okay
Yes, you can add frozen blueberries. But make sure to toss the blueberries in some all purpose flour so that it does not sink to the bottom.