Golden Almond Lemon Cake

How has April come and nearly gone without a post? So much for my once weekly commitment.

April isn't over yet and I'm shooting for four posts before it's all said and done, so there! It's about striving towards a goal, is it not?

I went surfing the web to find a recipe that fits the personality of Shelly for whom I made this cake. As always, if you work with me I make you a cake on your birthday. Easy are the people who put in specific requests. Cheesecake? Sure! Carrot Cake? No problem. But the vague, "surprise me" is fun and crazy making.

I'm not beyond experimenting on a person's birthday cake. Other less adventurous people might feel the need to try a cake out before serving it to others. I have no such compunction. We all can be surprised together. I mean it's cake, how bad can it really be?

So why this cake in particular? Mz. Shelly is both sunny like a lemon and a little nutty, like the almonds. She's also way more complex than you might imagine just at first glance. This cake looks regular but it has lemons and lemon oil, toasted almonds, sour cream, tons of butter and turbinado sugar. Sweet jesus, that is the whole she-bang.

The photo above is yet another Bundt cake, in the same pretty swirly pan, but this one is fancier than what meets the eye. I found it on Pastry Joe, (where has he been all my life?) it's his take on Rose Levy Beranbaum's cake (she I have known about for 20 years.) Her Cake Bible is on my bookshelf and I go back to it all the time. Hey Julie/Julia fans, someone should recreate that book and blog about it. Maybe that's so like 2005?

I'd detail out the recipe, but there's a link and Joe covered it pretty well. Oh and I haven't tasted yet. There might be a post script about this whole thing.