This Lemon Blueberry Cake is tangy, sweet, super moist, and creamy. It’s a delicious and beautiful cake. It comes with soft lemon cake layers, a sweet blueberry filling, and an ultra creamy lemon cream cheese frosting. Detailed step-by-step photos and video.
HOW TO MAKE SUPER DELICIOUS LEMON BLUEBERRY CAKE
The first thing we do is to prepare the blueberry filling. The filling is super easy to make, and you need just 3 ingredients. Blueberries, sugar, and freshly squeezed lemon juice. Combine all ingredients in a saucepan and bring over medium-high heat to a simmer.
Cook until the blueberries are soft and the sauce has thickened up and is reduced by 1/3, about 5-10 minutes. Stir constantly. You can mash the blueberries, puree them, or let them how they are. Remove from the heat and let cool to room temperature. It will thicken as it cools.
Now let’s make the lemon cake. Preheat oven to 350°F/175°C. Line the bottom and the sides of two 8 inches (20 cm) baking pans with parchment paper. Therefore place a cake pan on a piece of parchment and draw a circle with a pencil around the outside of the pan. Then cut about 0.05-0.1 inches (1-2mm) along the inside of the drawn circle. That’s the parchment for the bottom of the pan.
Then cut 2-inch (5cm) broad stripes for the sides of the pan. Place them in the inside of the pan and along the sides. Take non-stick spray and spray a bit underneath the paper that it sticks to the sides of the pan. Repeat with the second pan.
For me, this is the easiest method to remove the cake from the pan after baking.
In a small bowl combine flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
In a large bowl, beat oil, butter, and sugar until creamy. I decided to use butter and oil for the cake to have the best of both worlds. Oil makes the cake moist, and butter adds a great taste.
Add one egg at the time and mix until combined.
Alternately add dry and wet ingredients. Exactly in this order: dry ingredients, milk, dry ingredients, lemon juice, dry ingredients. Mix just to combine before you add the next ingredient.
In the end, add vanilla and lemon zest and mix just until combined. You can see that the batter is creamy and holds a soft peak. See picture below.
I recommend to measure the weight of the batter and equally fill it into the baking pans. In this way, you can be sure that your cake layers are equal in size and are baked through at the same time. Then spread the batter evenly that they are the same high from the center to the edges. Bake for 28-32 minutes until a toothpick centered in the middle comes out clean. Do not overbake the cake or it ends up dry. I bake mine for 28 minutes.
Let the cake cool down for about 10-15 minutes then remove from the pan and transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
In the picture below you see that I didn’t need to cut off the tops of my cakes because they were very straight and flat on the surface. That’s because I spread the cake batter evenly in the cake pans. They need to be everywhere the same high to get that result. If they are not flat on the surface, then please cut off a thin layer to create an even surface. That’s important that the cake is straight when you frost it.
Then cut each cake layer in half horizontally.
Okay, now we make the frosting. This lemon cream cheese frosting contains just 4 ingredients and is easy to make. You need butter, cream cheese, powdered sugar, and freshly squeezed lemon juice.
Start with mixing the butter until it is creamy, about 2 minutes. Please make sure to use room temperature butter for the frosting because it incorporates much better than cold butter, and the texture of the frosting is creamier with room temperature butter.
Then add cream cheese and mix until creamy and combined. You can use brick style cream cheese as it is available in the US or the spreadable one as it is available in the EU. It works either way. Just make sure that the cream cheese is room temperature that it incorporates well with the butter.
Sift in the powdered sugar and mix until creamy and fully combined.
In the end, add 1-2 tbsp of freshly squeezed lemon juice. The frosting has a light lemon taste. Add 1 tbsp at the time. The consistency should be creamy but firm enough to frost the cake. If the frosting is too soft, you can add more powdered sugar. If it is too firm, you can add more lemon juice. The consistency of the frosting should look like in the following pictures.
Then assemble the cake. Therefore place the first cake layer on a cake turner, stand, or serving plate and spread 1/4 of the frosting all over it. The frosting should be higher around the edges that it holds the blueberry filling inside the cake. See picture below.
Layer with 1/3 of the blueberry filling (where the frosting is lower).
Then repeat two more times. Place last cake layer on top and lightly frost the outside and the sides of the cake with the remaining frosting. Chill 4 hours in the fridge before serving.
FAQS ABOUT LEMON BLUEBERRY CAKE
WHY IS MY LEMON BLUEBERRY CAKE DENSE?
Too much of wet ingredients. Please make sure that you use the correct egg size. The recipe calls for large eggs, not extra-large. Also, don’t fill up the measuring cup until it spills over the sides when measuring wet ingredients.
Wrong or too little flour. I recommend using high-quality all-purpose flour. With a good flour brand like Bob’s Red Mill or King Arthur, you can’t go wrong. If you want to make it gluten-free, I recommend Bob’s Red Mill 1:1 as a substitution. Measure the flour correctly. The best is to use a kitchen scale.
Wrong oven temperature. I can’t stress enough how important it is to have an additional oven thermometer. The real oven temperature might differ from your oven dial. I always need to turn my oven dial about 20°F higher to reach the temperature I need. An additional oven thermometer saved me in many situations. If the oven is too cold, the cake doesn’t rise enough and takes too long to set.
Overmixing. After the oil, sugar, and butter are creamed together, mix at every step just until combined. Overmixing can result in too much gluten developing and this makes the cakes rising high in the oven and sinking as soon as you remove them from the oven. This can cause a dense cake.
WHY IS MY LEMON BLUEBERRY CAKE NOT RISING?
If your Lemon Blueberry Cake didn’t rise, there could be the following reasons: wrong or too little flour or the wrong oven temperature. Read more detailed explanations at the previous question.
It also can be that the baking powder has expired. I found a blog post about how to tell if baking powder has expired.
WHY IS MY LEMON BLUEBERRY CAKE DRY?
Too much flour. If you measure your ingredients with cups instead of a kitchen scale, please make sure to spoon and level the flour. A packed cup of flour equals 1.5 to 1.75 cups of spooned and leveled flour.
In the two following pictures, you can see a spooned and leveled cup of flour and a packed cup of flour. The spooned and leveled cup of flour weighs 120g. The packed cup of flour weighs 195g. That is 75g more. Although it’s almost safe to bake with the spoon and level method, it’s always the best to use a kitchen scale. The investment is worth every penny.
Overbaking. Set a timer that you don’t forget to remove the cake from the oven. Check with a toothpick centered in the middle after 28 minutes. The toothpick should come out clean with a few moist cake crumbs.
HOW TO DECORATE LEMON BLUEBERRY CAKE?
The frosting is just enough to make a naked cake. So if you don’t want to make a naked cake as I did, you may need about 1.5x of the frosting.
When it comes to cake decoration, let your fantasy play. I piped additional frosting over the cake and topped it with candied lemons and berries. The sour, sticky candied lemons are SO good and fit the cake just perfectly. In this blog post, you find a recipe for the candied lemons. These extra 10 minutes are well spent.
I also love to decorate my cakes with flowers. You can go with edible flowers if you get some.
You could also whip up some meringue, or top it with blueberry sauce, or decorate with whipping cream. Think of toppings which fit the cake and make it look pretty.
HOW TO STORE LEMON BLUEBERRY CAKE?
I recommend storing the cake in the fridge. If it is too warm and humid in your climate zone, the frosting could get too soft, and it wouldn’t last that long. If stored in the fridge, the cake stays fresh up to 4 days.
HOW TO FREEZE LEMON BLUEBERRY CAKE?
The whole cake: After chilling for 3 hours, place the Lemon Blueberry Cake in the freezer until it is firm, for about 2 hours. Remove the cake from the freezer and tightly wrap in plastic foil twice. Make sure that everything is covered. Then wrap two layers of tin foil around until completely covered. It freezes well up to 2 months.
Unwrap the cake and thaw in the fridge overnight. Eat within 2 days.
Single slices: Place the slice in the freezer for about 1 hour. Then remove from the freezer and tightly wrap in plastic foil twice, until fully covered. Place in a freezer bag and remove as much air as possible. It freezes well up to 2 months.
For thawing, unwrap the cake and place on the kitchen counter for 1-2 hours. Eat within 1 day.
Just the cake layers: After baking the cake layers, remove the paper and let cool completely. Then tightly wrap each cake layer in plastic foil twice. Place in freezer bags and remove as much air as possible. Freeze up to 1 month.
For thawing, unwrap the cake layers and let sit on the counter for about 1-2 hours. Once it is room temperature, make the filling and the frosting and assemble the cake as described.
Although the cake freezes well, it’s always best eaten fresh.
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