Raspberry Lemon Ricotta Pound Cake

Fruit and cheese goodness in a pound cake that you can have for breakfast or dessert.

Or breakfast AND dessert.

Or a snack.

Or because the kids are fighting.

Or because you can’t think of a decent reason not to.

This is one of those kind of cakes. You can eat it without feeling guilty. I mean, if you’re on a diet you probably should feel guilty, but you’ll survive.

Difficulty: easy
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Ingredients

· 5 T butter, softened to room temperature

· ¾ cup sugar

· 3 eggs, brought to room temperature

· ¾ cup ricotta cheese

· 2 T lemon juice, plus an additional 1 t, divided

· 2 T lemon zest

· 2 t vanilla

· 1 ½ cups flour

· 2 t baking powder

· ¼ t salt

· 2 cups frozen raspberries *

· 2 T powdered sugar

I used frozen raspberries…because I had frozen raspberries in my freezer. You can use blueberries or blackberries too, frozen or fresh, whatever you have and whatever you’d prefer.

Directions

Butter and flour a 9” x 5” loaf pan and set that aside.

In a bowl, beat together the butter and sugar with your hand mixer until smooth, about three minutes. Next add in the eggs and beat again until they’re well combined. Finally, add in the ricotta, 2 T of lemon juice, lemon zest and vanilla and again beat until everything is well combined.

In a separate small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt.

Take these dry ingredients, add them to the wet ingredients and mix just until everything is combined (don’t overmix – just get everything together).

Add in the raspberries and fold those into the batter with a wooden spoon.

Pour your batter into the prepared loaf pan and bake at 350 for about an hour, until the edges turn a nice golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out dry.

Take it out of the oven and put the whole pan on a wire rack to cool for about 15-20 minutes. While it’s still warm, remove the cake from the pan and let it cool completely on the wire rack.

Once the cake is cooled, take your remaining 1 t of lemon juice and mix it in a small bowl with the 2 T powdered sugar. Brush the glaze across the top of the cake and serve! Alternately, you can omit the last teaspoon of lemon juice and use the 2 T powdered sugar to dust the top of the cake – but I prefer the glaze, it adds just a little more lemon flavor.