Lemonade Cake with Raspberry Lemonade Frosting

All of the recipes I've posted so far on this blog have been savory ones, but my real specialty is desserts. I've been anticipating the arrival of spring pretty much since last October, so I decided to make a Lemonade Cake to last me through the last week of winter. Also, Andy and I just recently finished all of the desserts I got for my birthday and I always keep a little sugar pick-me-up somewhere in the apartment.

This cake was super easy to bake, mostly because I used a cake mix from a box. Let me explain: the oven in our apartment is a little unstable (if you set it for 350F, it usually ends up around 400-450F, but if you set it at 325F it gets around 300F). As a result, it tends to burn anything I bake (easily fixed by covering items with tinfoil) or it really dries out my homemade cakes.

First, I took one box of cake mix and I mixed it with all of the recommended ingredients (oil, eggs), except for one change: I substituted thawed lemonade concentrate for the 1 cup of water in the cake. I greased and floured (or rather, used that flour/oil in a spray can stuff) a 9x13 cake pan, and poured the ingredients in.

While the cake was cooking, I whipped up a quick lemonade raspberry buttercream frosting. It's basically one stick of butter (room temp), around three cups of powdered sugar, two tablespoons of pureed raspberries (I just happened to have some left over from my Darwin Day Chocolate Raspberry cake), and two tablespoons of the leftover lemonade concentrate. Since it's a buttercream, leave it out at room temp to make it easy to spread over the cake.

I got the cake out of the oven and I tasted a little bit of it and it didn't quite have the lemon taste that I was looking for. So I took the rest of the lemonade concentrate (probably around 1/4 cup), and I added 1-2 tablespoons of water to it. I pricked the cake all over with a toothpick and dripped the lemonade mixture over the cooling cake, just to moisten it up and give it an extra kick of lemon. Later, when the cake was cool, I spread the frosting over it and put it in the fridge to let the frosting set.

I really enjoyed this cake because it was easy, and the extra lemonade I poured over the cake made it super moist and tart. If you don't have any raspberries to puree laying around the house, just regular lemon buttercream frosting would be good as well. Next time, I think I'll use a smaller pan or double the cake recipe because the cake was only around 1-1.5 inches thick.

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Recipe: Lemonade Cake with Raspberry Lemonade Frosting

Cake Ingredients

1 box of yellow cake mix (plus all of the ingredients it calls for except for water)
1 c. of thawed lemonade concentrate (or enough to replace any water the cake mix calls for)

Frosting Ingredients

1 stick butter (room temp)
3 c. powdered sugar
1-2 T. lemonade concentrate
1-2 T. pureed, de-seeded raspberries

Directions

Mix all cake ingredients together and pour into greased pan. Bake according to directions on box. Mix together all frosting ingredients until you get a creamy consistency. Set aside and wait for cake to cool. While cake is cooling, prick all over with toothpick and drizzle over the extra thawed lemonade concentrate (with a little water added if you don't have enough to cover the cake). Frost, refrigerate for an hour, and serve!