Soft Lemon Almond Cakes with Cointreau Sour Cream

I’ve always wondered why most cake recipes involve so many different steps. Beating eggs and sugar, egg whites, yolk and sugar, butter or sugar, sometimes even in bain-marie! What if one just omitted all of those steps and combined all the ingredients together?

That’s exactly what I did with these small and soft lemon almond cakes. In addition, I used oil instead of butter, so one more step avoided – no melting needed! And, to my surprise, the result was more than just ok. These lemon cakes are perfect: soft, tasty, and served with a dollop of Cointreau-flavoured sour cream they are second to no other dessert I’ve had the pleasure of having so far.

Besides, they fit to my list of “desserts that make themselves”. When you start cooking the main dish, just set the oven to 190 C. To make the dough, you need about 2 minutes – do it either when waiting for something else (pasta to cook, for example) or just before serving the main dish. Then put the cakes into the oven, put an alarm on to 12 minutes, and enjoy your main dish while your dessert is taking care of itself.

For 5 portions you need:

• 2 eggs


• 4 Tbsp sugar


• 4 Tbsp ground almonds


• 2 Tbsp whole-grain flour


• 2 Tbsp yoghurt


• 4 Tbsp sunflower oil


• a pinch of salt


• the grated zest of 1 organic lemon

And for the cream:

• 150g sour cream


• 8g vanilla sugar


• 1 Tbsp Cointreau

... plus a couple of strawberries and lemon slices to decorate

1. Combine sugar, almonds, flour, and salt in a bowl.

2. Add eggs, oil, yoghurt, and lemon zest. Stir with a fork until well combined.

3. Divide into 5 muffin forms (silicone or other non-stick material) and bake in a preheated oven for about 12 minutes, or until well set.

4. Remove from the form, place on 5 plates, and decorate with a lemon slice, strawberries, and a dollop of sour cream flavoured with Cointreau and vanilla sugar. Enjoy with a good espresso, for example!