Meyer Lemon Overload

About a week ago, a coworker of mine brought a huge bag of Meyer lemons to work.  Most people only took one or none (!), so my friend Becky and I split the bulk of them.  And so began a week and a half of lemon debauchery.  I didn't preserve any, which I kind of wish I had now.  Instead, I made as many desserts as I could. 

I made two Shaker Lemon Pies, one pan of Last Minute Blueberry Lemon Bars, and one incredible Meyer Lemon Cake.  And I still have one lemon left.  I think I will be making the Meyer Lemon Cake again - it was a veritable knockout.  I am salivating just thinking about it.  So moist! So tangy, and yet so sweet!  I will be adding pictures when I get home to further excite your taste buds.  For now, here's a quick pic of some sliced up lemons just waiting to get macerated...

In other Food Hotline news, I have been failing to bring you most of my call and email requests for advice and assistance.  Here I will share a few gems from recent weeks.  There was the question of trussing a chicken - what to do if you don't have any twine to tie the legs together.  And then a call about making a quick birthday icing for a lovely lady's last minute cake.  Oh, and let's not forget about Scuffins, or the muffins that call for chia seeds (what!), which I have still yet to try!  Don't worry, reader, I will flesh out all of these exciting thoughts momentarily...

Birthday Cake

The Emergency Food Hotline received a call on Tuesday evening from a friend who lives nearby, who had decided to throw a birthday party for another friend. Trouble was that he didn't have a cake, which is where I came in. He wanted a "very special cake." There were a few clues (carrot, vanilla), but mostly I was on my own. Since moving across the country, I don't have most of my very favorite cookbooks on hand...they are hiding away in lonely boxes somewhere waiting for me to grab them up again (one day!).

So I looked up one of my favorite cake/icing combinations online, altered the recipe to suit my tastes, and here we have it: Ginger Carrot cake with Lemon Cream Cheese icing. It was quite moist, not too dense, and I added extra fresh ginger and a bit of minced dried apricot to brighten it up. Then I took a regular cream cheese icing recipe and added fresh lemon zest and juice, a tiny bit of vanilla, and there it was. It has a brightness that complimented the richness of the carrot well. Yum o'clock.