Lemon Celebration Cake!
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This Lemon Celebration Cake combines a light, citrus-infused sponge with a warm lemon drizzle, pockets of tangy lemon curd, and a beautifully whipped lemon buttercream frosting. With a 15-minute prep time and 35 minutes in the oven, it’s a foolproof, elegant crowd-pleaser perfect for any summer gathering or tea party.
Notes from The Patisserie
After posting the recipe for my Victoria sponge celebration cake, I figured it would be so much fun if I experimented on this and produced different flavours. When I asked on my Facebook and Instagram page recently if anyone had any suggestions, and to my joy many of you suggested a lemon celebration cake!
I feel a lemon flavour for a celebration cake is always a safe flavour as (usually) everyone likes lemon. I also find its perfect for after dinner as the zesty and fresh lemon cleanses your mouth leaving a refreshing aftertaste.
The secret to a truly moist citrus sponge is all in the timing of that drizzle. Pouring a warm liquid sugar mixture over the cake layers the second they come out of the oven ensures it sinks deep into the centre. If you wait until the cake cools, the surface seals up, and the drizzle will simply pool on top, leaving you with a sticky exterior and a dry middle.
Lemon drizzle sponge
While a massive multi-layered cake looks stunning, a reliable two-layer sandwich cake is much easier to bake, handle, and slice. It allows you to simply slather a thick, luxurious layer of buttercream and tangy lemon curd right in the centre without worrying about the cake shifting, collapsing, or leaning on display. For the perfect sponge I use:
- Butter – unsalted butter at room temperature or baking spread works perfectly
- Sugar – I use caster sugar here to create the smooth creamy texture with the butter
- Eggs – as usual I am using medium eggs
- Flour – self raising flour provides the perfect lift to your sponge
- Zest of lemons – natural lemon zest provides that non-synthetic flavouring along with the juice
- Lemon juice – enhances the flavour even more
How to keep your lemon buttercream from splitting
Adding real fruit juice to a fat-based buttercream can be intimidating, and many comments are souly around the fact that their buttercream is splitting. But, with a little patience this will prove to be the saving method for perfect buttercream.
Always start by whipping your real block butter completely on its own for a few minutes until it is perfectly smooth and pale. Sifting and adding your icing sugar slowly builds a sturdy structure that can easily lock in the liquid lemon juice at the end without curdling or weeping. Take your time.
FAQs
Absolutely! While homemade lemon curd is simple to whip up, a high-quality, luxury shop-bought lemon curd works beautifully and saves you extra prep time.
If you don’t have enough fresh lemon juice left to finish the buttercream frosting, you can easily substitute it with 2 teaspoons of high-quality lemon extract instead.
Yes, easily! Because these 8-inch sponge layers bake up thick and sturdy, you can carefully slice each cooled sponge horizontally in half using a long serrated bread knife to create a gorgeous, towering four-layer showstopper.
Caster sugar has a fine grain that dissolves perfectly into warm lemon juice without making it overly thick or gummy, allowing the liquid to run deeply into the baked cake crumbs.
Lemon Celebration Cake!
Ingredients
Cake
- 350 g unsalted butter
- 350 g caster sugar
- 7 medium eggs
- 350 g self raising flour
- zest of 2 lemons
- 75 ml lemon juice
Drizzle
- 75 ml lemon juice
- 75 g caster sugar
Decoration
- 2-3 tbsp lemon curd
- 200 g unsalted butter (room temperature)
- 400 g icing sugar
- 2 tbsp lemon juice
- spare lemon curd
Instructions
Cake
- Grease & line two 8"/20cm deep cake tins and preheat your oven to 180ºc/160ºc fan.
- Beat together the unsalted butter & caster sugar until smooth – this will take a couples of minutes!
- Once combined add the self raising flour, eggs, lemon zest and lemon juice and beat until combined – try not to over beat!
- Pour the mixture evenly into the two tins and bake in the oven for 35-40 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.
Drizzle
- Towards the end of baking – in a bowl, mix together your 75ml lemon juice and 75g caster sugar together.
- Once the cake is baked, drizzle this over the cakes, whilst still in the tin. Let the cakes cool fully.
Decoration
- Beat the unsalted butter for a couple of minutes using the whisk attachment with a stand mixer – doing this will make it nice and smooth!
- Once smooth, start gradually adding the icing sugar until it’s all fully mixed in.
- Add the lemon juice, and beat for about 5 minutes on a medium-high speed until super light and whipped.
- Pipe some buttercream in a circle round the edge of the top of your first sponge, and then add the lemon curd into the middle.
- Place the other cake on top, and pipe on the rest of the buttercream however you wish.
- Drizzle on some spare lemon curd, and add some sprinkles and enjoy!
Notes
- This cake will last in an airtight container for 3-4 days – probably longer as it has so much moisture.
You can freeze it for up to 3 months. - If you don’t have any lemon juice for the decoration, use 2 tsp lemon extract instead.
- I use these 8″ cake tins
- I use this medium 2D closed star piping tip
- I use these piping bags
Storage and freezing
Because of the incredible moisture from the fresh lemon drizzle, this celebration cake stays remarkably fresh and soft. Store it in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 to 4 days. Avoid putting it in the fridge, as the cold temperature will firm up the butter in the sponges and make them taste dry.
To freeze ahead, wrap the un-iced, fully cooled and drizzled sponge layers tightly in a double layer of cling film and store them in the freezer for up to 3 months. Simply defrost them on your counter overnight before whipping up fresh buttercream and assembling.
Related recipes
I love a lemon recipe and have a fair few of them on my blog, and I can tell you guys do too – for example my lemon drizzle cheesecake, lemon drizzle cupcakes, lemon bars, even my lemon and blueberry blondies.
Hi,
What would the quantity of larges eggs be for this recipe as I have no medium eggs, only large?
Also would the buttercream work if I added lime juice instead to make it a lemon and lime flavoured cake? X
For this I would use 6 large – and yes you can indeed use lime!
Hi Jane,
This cake looks amazing!
I am planning on making it for a birthday but splitting the 2 deep layers in half to have 4 layers and have buttercream around the sides as well as on top and in between layers. How much icing sugar/ butter would I need to do this?
Thank you!
I would double the mix but be careful not to add too much liquid so it can hold up around the sides! x
Hello i love your cakes and would love to follow your lemon celebration cake recipe . .. only I can’t get hold of any self raising flour at the moment. I have heard you can add 1 tsp of baking powder to ever 150g of plain flour to create the same effect. Would this work okay with your recipe? Or is there something else you could recommend? Thanks 🙂
It’s 2 level tsps, per 150g of plain flour, whisked in before adding to a recipe!
Hi Jane,
I am looking to make a lemon cake similar to this one but I want to buttercream the outside of it. Would you recommend a lemon buttercream or just a normal one?
Thanks
I would generally recommend a plain buttercream without any liquid added so it’ll hold up – but you could easily add in lemon flavouring as there’s a lot less liquid that way!
Hi Jane, I love all your recipes but this just didn’t work for me! I followed the recipe word for word but instead of using 2 tins, I used 1 and thought I would split in half. It came out and it was so so flat and had not risen at all. It would have been impossible to cut in half. I had to them bake again so had to use all ingredients again to get another layer. Really disappointed 🙁
It’s because you did it in one tin. The recipe is designed for two. When baking a deep cake, I wouldn’t use the lemon juice in the sponge, I would bake at a lower temp, and it takes a much much longer time.
Hi Jane,
This sounds like a brilliant option for my Gran’s 95th birthday cake. I was going to add in some blueberries to the mix- do you think this would work?
Love reading your recipes, thank you!
Have a look at my lemon & blueberry cake and go from there! x
Could I split the mixture into three 6 inch cake tins instead? (And bake for slightly less) Or would I need to alter the quantities?
Looks delicious! I’ve made your lemon curd a few times- never lasts long so would love to have a go at this cake too!
Would this cake hold up to fondant decorations on top? It won’t be covered in fondant but rather a Swiss meringue buttercream with fondant dec’s on top.
I don’t see why not – generally for me though I always use a madeira style when covering as it does make it firmer and easier. Probably best to chill the sponges first so they are firmer!
Hi Jane, I’m looking to bake a 3 tier lemon semi naked sponge for my nieces birthday. Is this recipe suitable for stacking?
This looks beautiful; the layers are perfect and I love the zesty lemon curd filling. I could really go for a slice right now.
Thank you so much, Lou! It would go perfectly with your Gin Lemon Curd!
Hi,
I’m looking to make a wedding cake for a friend, but need would need it to be a 10inch, 3 layer cake, is this recipe able to be adapted to this?
Also it will be the bottom tier with a vegan cake on top, is the cake sturdy enough to do this? (I am using dowels)
Thanks
It would work as a 10″! I usually use 1.6x a recipe for a 10″ – If the cake is dowelled correctly it should be fine anyway – but if you’re unsure you could make a madeira type lemon sponge for the bottom instead so there’s no slipping!
Made this for my Mums birthday earlier this week – so lemony. Made it as two tiers; lovely deep cake. I bought a very good quality lemon curd as an alternative to homemade. Love your recipes, thank you.