Lemon Ricotta Cake

This incredibly bright and velvety Lemon Ricotta Cake gets it’s amazing texture from a ricotta cheese and olive oil base and packs a flavor pucker punch with no shortage of lemon zest and juice!

Nothing is better than a lemon cake! And this lemon ricotta cake is one of the finest in town. Ricotta cheese isn’t an ingredient that you always reach for when baking, but Italians have been in on the secret for a long time now!

Adding ricotta to your baked goods gives a ridiculously moist and silky texture and, in Sicily, a lemon ricotta cake is often a breakfast treat.

Ingredients

This lemon cake recipe requires only a handful of ingredients, so quality is key here!

• All-purpose flour. Often I use a cake flour for cakes, but because this is such a velvety cake, and it’s a hearty snacking cake, I recommend all-purpose flour this time!
• Olive oil. Use a virgin or extra-virgin oil, but you don’t need to buy the top of the line brand. A quality, light oil is great here.
• Baking powder. Gives us a light and airy texture.
• Eggs. The structure of our cake.
• Granulated sugar & vanilla extract. Just enough sweetness to balance out the lemon!
• Lemon juice and lemon zest. This is critical! Only use fresh lemon juice and zest. Skip the bottled juices or lemon extracts – only a true lemon can give us this amazing flavor!

Making & Baking a Ricotta Cake

Ricotta cakes are very easy, like, almost too easy because I will quickly whip one up any day of the week. And I can because I usually have a tub of ricotta in the fridge (it’s great on pastas and toasts, p.s.)

Baking with Ricotta Cheese

Ricotta cheese is found in the speciality cheese area of most, if not all, grocery stores. Look for a “full fat” or “whole milk” ricotta cheese to ensure we have a super creamy texture.

Ricotta cheese has subtly sweet, creamy and slightly granular characteristics. If you notice a ton of liquid, it’s better to strain some by placing the ricotta in a cheesecloth over a strainer and applying a little pressure. But most brands I’ve tried are not too thin if you use a whole milk brand.

Ricotta is also pretty easy to make at home with a little milk, acid and heat, but like I said: this is an easy cake, so let’s buy it this time!

Baking with Lemons

In this ricotta cake, we use both lemon zest and lemon juice. Lemon juice is very flavorful but you can only use a little of it in a cake without messing with the texture and ending up with rubber.

This is why we are also going to use lemon zest. Lemon zest is the yellow outer skin of the lemon and it has a ton of tart lemon flavor.

To get the zest, use a microplane or grater to remove just the yellow layer, leaving the white pith layer behind (the pith is very bitter).

Lemon zest gets it’s flavor due to the oil that is in the skin, so to really get the best flavor, zest the lemon directly into your bowl of granulated sugar then massage the sugar a bit to really release all that flavor!

Putting the Cake Together

I said this cake was easy, right? Well, I’m not lying. In one bowl, whisk together you dry ingredients.

In a second bowl, whisk together your wet ingredients. Baking nerd moment: sugar is considered a wet ingredient because it melts in heat in case you were wondering!

Stir the two bowls together. Done. Seriously, that’s it!

If you want to get crazy, and I always do, after you bake the cake, you can add a lemon glaze by mixing a little lemon juice and a bit of confectioners’ sugar and spread it on top.

Looking for Other Lemon Desserts?

Give these other pucker-perfect lemon desserts taste!

• Lemon Crinkle Cookies
• Lemon Blueberry Tart
• Lemon Poppy Muffins
• Lemon Thyme Shortbread
• Lemon Poppy Layer Cake