About a month ago I ran into Kathleen at Target when we both happened to be visiting our families in Abilene. Having not seen each other in years and realizing we were both now in Dallas we planned to hang out. She's a busy lady though, so I promised her cake as a means of tempting her to venture downtown to see me. I ended up making several mini-cake (no, not cupcake) versions of this recipe for lemon-thyme cupcakes. After my defeat with the cornmeal and rosemary...
I wanted to give herbs another go so this seemed like a good choice.
The cake was pretty simple, and the lack of butter (and thus no need to remember to set out the butter 4 hours before I want to start baking) has won me over on the olive oil cake.
While I waited for the lemon zest to infuse the sugar, I broke out the mezzaluna and minced the thyme. For those that use a lot of fresh herbs in their cooking, you should really get a mezzaluna.
After the oil and eggs, I alternated mixing in the lemon juice and dry ingredients.
Instead of making a full layer cake, or normal cupcakes, I opted to test out the mini cheesecake pan I bought and then never used. They turned out pretty well, and made a better sized cake than a muffin tin in my opinion. The removable bottom also made it easier to get the cakes out with no need for a paper liner.
While the cakes cooled, I whipped the frosting. I was nervous to use balsamic vinegar after my last encounter with it, but this worked out far better. The balsamic is only a background flavor in the whipped cream and compliments the lemon/thyme in the cake very well. I could see using this with chocolate cakes as well.
The cakes turned out tasting very lemony. I would almost compare them to lemon bars in their flavor. The cake was also fairly dense, but not too heavy, I assume due to the olive oil. In any event, the critics were pleased...
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