Limeade Cake

Last week was my Grandma’s 86th birthday. (That’s right, Grandma, I just shared your age with the world!) I made her this cake.

She’s a citrus girl. Originally this was going to be lemonade flavor for her but limeade is the what I remember drinking at her house as a kid so it seemed fitting to go with that flavor instead.

Limeade straight from concentrate. The horror, huh? I loved it!

Oh. . and that other concentrate juice, Five Alive! Do you remember that? My Grandma always had that stuff in the freezer. Do they still make that? Now, that would make a great cake!

This is my Grandma. Isn’t she cute?

This is Grandma blowing out the candles. (1 candle for each decade to 80 and then 1 each year after. . so really she’s only 14!) I hope she kept her spit to herself. My secret fear of birthday cakes is spit. . .especially kid parties. . .ewww. You know you fear the spit, too. Don’t act like you don’t think it.

This is Grandma realizing the candles just RE-LIT themselves! What the. . . ?

This is Grandma realizing that her family is a bunch of brats! (Insert stronger language if you like. I would but Grandma won’t approve.)

That’s right. We put trick candles on the cake of a woman in her 80’s! You gotta a problem with that?

Grandma gets teased pretty relentlessly. By me, for certain, but also by the rest of her grandkids. I figure that it’s not being disrespectful to my elders so much as it is doing what I must have been taught by the matriarch of the family. Also known as Grandma. I mean I had to learn it somewhere, right? Probably from her. (I blame all my bad habits on her! Shhh. . don’t tell her.)

BTW. . .this is what happens to a cake sometimes when you have a food blog. You cut a piece for photos while the light is good and THEN you let the birthday girl have a go at it. Thus the missing piece.

This cake is dense and moist and yummy. It has a very pound cake-esque denseness about it.

My theory is that it would be great as a bundt cake without the icing. Maybe a lime glaze instead. It’s on my list of things to try now. Lemonade would be good, too. Or orange!! That is a great plan!

Limeade Cake

1 1/3 cup sugar

6 Tbsp butter, room temp

1 Tbsp lime zest

4 Tbsp thawed limeade concentrate

2 tsp vanilla

2 eggs

2 egg whites

2 2/3 cups cake flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 1/2 c fat-free buttermilk

In a large mixing bowl, cream together the butter and sugar. Add the lime zest, concentrate and vanilla. Beat in the eggs and egg whites. Add the flour, baking powder, soda and salt. Carefully incorporate the dry ingredients into the wet.  Then incorporate the buttermilk and mix well.

Pour into a greased 9×13 pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Cool completely and frost however you like.

I used this icing and I added 2 Tbsp of lime zest. You only need half the recipe. Either make 2 cakes or just cut the recipe in half before you make it.