Yuzu Pound Cake with a Yuzu Glaze

Once a year, when yuzu briefly appears over winter, we make this cake. Just once. 

Yuzu can be a little hard to come by, but if you can get your hands on the real thing, it's so worth it. That floral, tart citrus is unlike anything else. 

We always have ours with a bowl of freshly whisked matcha on the side. No milk, no sweetener. The savoury umami cuts through the sweetness of the cake in the best way possible.

If you want to take it further, reserve some of the batter, sift a tsp or so of matcha in and marble the matcha cake batter through before baking. It's visually beautiful and deepens the flavour throughout. Not quite wagashi, but it's the closest we'll get for now.

INGREDIENTS
 - 1 + 1/2 cups plain flour (white or white spelt work well)
 - 1+1/2 tsp baking powder
 - pinch salt
 - 230g block buttter, softened at room temperature
 - 1 cup white sugar
 - 3 large eggs, at room temperature
 - 60g greek yoghurt
 - Zest of one yuzu
 - Fresh juice of 3~ yuzu’s
 - Dash of vanilla

YUZU GLAZE
-1 cup icing sugar, sifted
-2 tbsp freshly squeezed yuzu juice
-A dash of milk, or as much as required to make the glaze thin enough to pour over the pound cake

METHOD:
1. Preheat your oven to 180°C. Grease a loaf pan with olive oil or melted butter and then line with non-stick baking paper.

2. To begin, sift your dry ingredients including the flour, baking powder and a pinch of salt into a large bowl and whisk to combine. Set aside for later.

3. Add your softened butter to a relevant bowl and using either a handheld mixer or a stand mixer such as a KitchenAid, beat the butter on high until smooth, creamy and slightly pale in colour. Then slowly pour in the white sugar and beat for further for 3 minutes or so.

4. One by one, crack an egg into the butter & sugar mixture, whisking on a medium speed. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as required. Continue to beat until the mixture is creamed, light and fluffy. After whisking in the third egg, stop the mixture and add the greek yoghurt, juice of the yuzu making sure to sieve the pips of the fruit, and the dash of vanilla. Continue to beat of a medium speed - at this point, the batter may look curdled and as if it is separating. Don’t be alarmed as this will all be combined once the dry ingredients have been added.

5. Again, using your stand or hand-held mixture, or a manual balloon whisk, slowly add your sifted dry ingredients into the bowl with the butter, sugar, eggs and yuzu juice and mix until the dry ingredients have been fully incorporated into the batter. Make sure to whisk enough to get rid of any flour-y lumps; however, ensuring not to over-mix.

7. Place in the preheated oven anything between 60-90minutes all up, covering the cake with aluminium foil so that the top of the cake doesn’t burn. Take the aluminium foil off around the 45 minute/50 minute mark to allow the top of the cake to turn a nice golden brown colour. Cake is ready when a skewer inserted comes out clean without any wet batter. There’s a good chance the cake may take longer to fully bake, depending on your oven. Check and continue to bake as required.

8. While your cake is baking, prepare the icing by sifting the icing sugar into a medium sized bowl, adding the juice of the yuzu and a dash or milk, adjusting the amount of milk depending on how thick you’d like your glaze.

9. Once the cake is ready, remove from the oven and allow it to cool in the pan for 45 minutes~1hr. Then remove the cake and transfer to a wire cooling rack. Pour the yuzu glaze over the cake when it has completely cool or when the cake is still slightly warm.
10. Slice and enjoy, with a side of freshly prepared Slow Article matcha.