Vegivore Eats | English Lavender-Citrus Bundt Cake

Lavender: not just a pretty purple flower!  This cousin of the mint family is also a hardy, flavorful culinary herb.  It seems odd, and maybe a little scary, to put something in your food that could just as easily go in a bath product or sachet, but adding the dried buds in moderation to baked goods gives them a certain something that diners can't put their finger on, something lightly herbal that adds just the right amount of perfume to the recipe.

Take this cake for example.  A tablespoon of dried blossoms (from The Herb Lyceum at Gilson's, Groton, MA) infuses the cake with this incredible "green" taste, pairing beautifully with the lemon and orange flavors and allowing its front-and-center nature to be tempered by the tangy yogurt within and the honey glaze on top.

It's truly a winner.  Moist, with excellent crumb structure and the most subdued of full flavors, this cake tastes of sweet citrus flowers, pine and rosemary. Also -- what can I say -- I like big Bundts and I cannot lie!  The dramatic size makes quite the lasting impression -- one recipe will feed 12-16 people at once.  Combining flavor with the calming aromatherapy and infusion benefits of lavender, it's the perfect end to a progressive or multi-course meal. Perhaps one of the better cakes I've ever made, nevermind tasted.

ENGLISH LAVENDER-CITRUS BUNDT CAKE

serves 12-16

For the cake:

vegetable shortening for the pan

3 cups cake flour*

1 tsp baking soda

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1 stick salted butter

1 stick unsalted butter

1 1/4 cups granulated sugar

1 Tbs dried lavender flowers

 4 eggs, lightly beaten

1/2 tsp orange extract

1 c strawberry Greek yogurt

1 Tbs lemon zest

*IMPORTANT -- have your butter, eggs and yogurt at room temperature before beginning, about 40 minutes out of the fridge*

For the glaze:

2 Tbs orange blossom honey

1/2 cup powdered sugar, plus extra for finishing

1 Tbs fresh-squeezed lemon juice

First, preheat your oven to 325.  

Generously grease a 10 or 12-cup Bundt pan (full size) with vegetable shortening.  Don't use butter!  The shortening will allow your cake to eventually release from the most complicated of cake pans.  Add some flour to the pan and rotate it, flouring all the greased surface and tapping out the excess.  Set aside.

In a small bowl, whisk together the cake flour, baking soda and baking powder.  Set aside.

Using your hand mixer on low (with beater attachment), cream the butter for about a minute.  It should be light yellow and fluffy.  Add the sugar and the lavender, and continue to mix on low for another few minutes, scraping down the bowl's sides with a spatula as needed.

Add in the eggs, approximately one at a time, while still having the mixer running, then add the orange extract.

Next, beating continuously, add a third of the flour mixture, followed by half the yogurt, followed by another third of the flour mixture, followed by the rest of the yogurt, ending with the last of the flour. Stop to scrape down the bowl as necessary.

Fold in the lemon zest.

Plop the batter into your prepared pan, creating a kind of ravine around the center hole, ensuring that in the end the middle won't rise higher than the sides.

Bake one hour in the preheated oven.

Cool 15 minutes on a wire rack with parchment paper underneath.

During that time, make your glaze.  Gently heat the honey in a saucepan, so it gets all melty and easier to pour.  Add in the powdered sugar and lemon juice and stir until the glaze comes together.

After 15 minutes is up, it's time to unmold your cake (say a little prayer...but you shouldn't need it if you prepared your pan properly).  Carefully flip the pan over and give a good shake (close to the rack!). The cake should nearly effortlessly come out. If it doesn't, whack the bottom a few times with something like a wooden spoon.

Once the cake is out and sitting pretty, either drizzle the glaze or use a pastry brush to apply it all over the cake.

Cool at least 2 hours before slicing and serving.

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PRO TIP: No cake flour?  Save yourself a trip to the store and the extra expense/pantry space by adding 2 Tbs corn starch to a 1-cup measuring cup, then filling/leveling the rest of the cup with all-purpose flour.  Voila, that's one cup of cake flour.