Lemon cake wanna be

A few years ago I made the perfect lemon cake, it was moist, just sweet enough, and reminiscent of the one from Starbucks.

And then I lost the recipe...since I have a guest's announcement tomorrow, I wanted to make something they don't normally eat every day, and that would be a lemon cake. Scrolling through the internet and trying to remember at least what the photo looks like I came across countless recipes with cutting variations.

Then I decided on this one, all the ingredients are listed, I will just write the preparation process.

Whisk the room temperature softened butter separately with a mixer, then add the sugar and continue mixing until butter and sugar are nicely combined.

Sift the baking powder and flour before adding them to the mixture, continue with mixing and adding the flour slightly.

Wash the lemons (very often I keep them in water with baking soda for a while), grate the crust, and squeeze the juice.

Add lemon juice and grated crust to the mixture.

Now that it's all combined together, we have eggs left. I was a little confused by the recipe I found, which listed only the ingredients but not the making process, so I did it my way. Add egg by egg while whisking.

Puffy cream is what we need in the end. Grease the container, you can also use a bundt mold or any shape you have.

Pour the mixture into the mold, shake it a couple of times on the surface so that all the dough falls nicely to the bottom, and bake it for 30 minutes on 180ºC.

Failed! What the actually f***?

I baked it longer than 30 minutes, cause I could see the dough wasn't ready all over and this is what I got.
Dough that crumbles.

Ok, I don't have much time left, about 30 minutes before I have to go to the scheduled meeting, later I won't have time to do everything all over again, and I really don't want to throw all this effort away.

I want a lemon cake and I will get it even in another form!
Oh my, I was so pissed off...

This you won't find in the original recipe, so write it down in case you meet the same faith.

Lemon syrup:

100 ml water
200 gr crystal sugar
3-4 tablespoons of lemon juice

Boil the water, add the sugar, and stir until it starts to constrict.

Add the lemon juice at the very end and move aside.

Crush the dough with your hands, separate the portion according to the size of the crust, pour 2-3 tablespoons of syrup over each, mix and form the cake crust.

This cake does not contain any kind of creams, and I need it in this case, otherwise, the whole dessert in this form is meaningless. Luckily I had 500ml of heavy cream - in stock.

Along the way, I made a list in my head of combinations that go well with lemon, and everything that came to my mind was vanilla.

First crust formed and topped with whipped cream.

I repeated the process with syrup and portions, coated with cream, so I had a total of 3 "layers"

I don't know if the problem is in the recipe or my oven, the ingredients (although I doubt they differ too much), the cake did smell the way it should, but cutting it as a loaf was not possible.

A little later, the cake syringe is ready (one of my favorite kitchen tools) btw.
At least it looks decent, no need to mention I was very close to starting crying.

Voilà, it's a cake!

I added two slices of lemon as a decoration and an indication of what the cake is made of.

It looks quite mushy, it cuts well, it will still take time to overnight and soak all, but I already like that balanced taste of lemon and sweetness.

Dammit, this was such a Saturday's unplanned adventure.

Bon appetit, guys! 🍴

P.S

Store the excess leftover dough in the freezer, it will come in handy for some quick treats served in a glass.