Lemon Polenta Cake

This wonderful lemony concoction has an Italian-Spanish flavour to it

as it is made with polenta and almonds.

The combination of these two ingredients, which replace the use of flour,

give a desirable moistness to the cake that you don't get with flour.

Imagine what lemon curd tastes like in a cake...

This is the manifestation of your imagining.

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Ingredients:

For the cake:

200g soft unsalted butter, plus some for greasing

200g caster sugar

200g ground almonds

100g fine polenta or yellow cornmeal

7.5ml baking powder

3 eggs

zest of two lemons

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For the Syrup:

juice of 2 lemons

125g icing sugar

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Method:

Preheat the oven to 180C. Line the base of an 8 inch round cake tin with baking paper and grease its sides lightly with butter.

Beat the butter and sugar until pale and whipped.

Mix together the almonds, polenta and baking powder and beat a third of this into the butter and sugar mixture, followed by one egg. Add another third of the polenta mixture and then another egg. Repeat with the last of the polenta mixture and the last egg.

Finally, beat in the lemon zest and pour your mixture into your cake tin.

Bake in the oven for 40 minutes. Test that the cake is done by inserting a skewer in the centre - it should come out clean if the cake is done. Another way to see if the cake is done is that the edges of the sponge will have shrunk from the sides of the tin slightly. Remove from the oven and allow to cool in the tin.

Meanwhile, make the syrup by boiling together the lemon juice and the icing sugar in a small saucepan. Once the sugar has dissolved, the syrup is ready. Prick the top of the cake all over with a skewer and pour the warm syrup over the cake. Leave it to cool before removing from the tin.