Lemon Blueberry Coffeecake and Cupcakes with Lemon Cream Cheese Icing

This weekend, I made a lemon blueberry coffee cake with the lemon cream cheese icing that was supposed to go with the lemon blueberry yogurt cookies. Can you tell I've had lemon-blueberry cravings recently? Lemon is my favourite flavour. I just love the tart sweetness of lemons! And blueberries go great with lemon, especially during the late summer when blueberries are in season. But unfortunately this most recent baking escapade used up all the rest of my summer time blueberries.

I learned a valuable life skill while making this cake. I learned how to grease, flour, and paper a cake pan.  It's true I had to look it up on YouTube, but I know how to do it. And it's actually not hard. I was surprised. In fact this whole baking thing is so much easier than I thought at the beginning of the summer. It's amazing how much I have learnt in the kitchen this summer, in addition to everything I have learnt in the field and in the lab.

Anyways before I rant away this whole blog post (which I could do) I'll get back on topic. Here's the video I used to learn how to grease, flour, and paper a cake pan. It's really great and has quite a few helpful hints!

After preparing the cake pan, I made the batter. The recipe was for a cake of 10 inches and I thought I had a 10 inch cake pan, until I started to pour the batter and realized it was an 8 inch cake pan. So in addition to making an 8 inch cake, I also made a dozen cupcakes.



 Here's the recipe for both:

Lemon Blueberry Coffeecake

Ingredients
1/2 cups blueberries, preferably fresh
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened and cut into 1 tablespoon pieces
1 1/2 cups sour cream (I used low fat and it worked great)
3 eggs, at room temperature
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 tablespoon finely grated lemon zest (about one lemon)

To make the cake

Preheat oven to 350 degrees (180 C). Lightly grease and flour a 10-inch round springform pan, or a 9×13-inch cake pan; set aside.

In a small bowl, toss the blueberries with the 2 tablespoons of flour; set aside.

In a large bowl, or the bowl of a standing mixer, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Add the butter, a few pieces at a time, until incorporated. Next add about half of the sour cream, and mix until the dough comes together. Add the remaining sour cream, eggs, vanilla, and zest and beat on medium speed until smooth, light in color, and fluffy. Scrape the bowl, making sure there are no streaks of flour or other ingredients remaining. Gently stir in the blueberries until just incorporated (do not over-mix).

Spread the cake batter in the prepared pan.

Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, until the cake springs back to your touch, and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Allow to cool for at least an hour before adding the icing. 

As a side note, I didn't have any sour cream, so after looking online I put in 1 and 1/2 cups of plain yogurt and an extra teaspoon of baking powder in instead.
I put the recipe for the icing in the post right before this one. I added double the amount of lemon juice the recipe called for in the icing, and also added that same amount to the cake batter before baking. Can you tell I love lemon yet?


The cake turned out really well! The best cake I've ever made, and one of the best I've ever had. I took it to work with me on Monday and it was demolished very fast by everyone in my lab. There are two main parts to baking: the actual baking and the sharing/collective eating of the baked good. I have so much joy from doing both of these fun activities!