Citrus Poppy Seed Cake

The formula for Perfect Citrus Poppy Seed Cake

This recipe is basically a citrus-poppy seed pound cake. The classic pound cake recipe is equal parts (by weight) of flour, sugar, eggs and butter. At this link you can learn all about the the “baker’s formula” or “baker’s percentage”.

Compared to the basic pound cake recipe this is a little heavier on eggs than flour because I wanted a slightly spongy texture for the cake.

Of course I used my favorite reverse creaming method as I do for all butter cakes. The result is a light and tender cake that still has the rich buttery flavor of a pound cake.

Ingredients

Ingredient Notes

• Cake Flour – Low protein cake flour makes a more tender and soft cake crumb. I don’t recommend substituting all purpose flour in this recipe.
• Eggs – There is a fairly high proportion of eggs in this recipe for a slightly spongy texture. Whipping the whites separately softens and lightens the cake crumb.
• Poppy Seeds – For the best results, don’t skip the step for soaking the poppy seeds. You can learn more about soaking the seeds in the special informational section below.
• Citrus – I like the combination of orange, lime and lemon. But you can use all lemon, all orange, all lime or any combination.

• Pour milk over the poppy seeds and stir to combine.
• Set the seeds aside to soak for 3 hours.
• Drain the seeds and discard the milk.
• In a large mixing bowl, combine the dry ingredients with the citrus zest.

• Cream the dry ingredients with the butter and beat until aerated. Add the egg yolks.
• Add the soaked poppy seeds.
• Fold the batter together until the seeds are evenly distributed.
• Fold in the whipped egg whites.

• Spread the batter into the prepared pan and bake.
• While the cake bakes, combine the citrus juice with powdered sugar to make a glaze and with granulated sugar to make a syrup.
• As soon as the cake comes out of the oven, drizzle half the syrup over the cake. After 10 minutes flip the cake out of the pan and drizzle with the rest of the syrup.
• Drizzle the glaze over the cake and allow it to set.

Why do we soak poppy seeds before baking?

Recipes that include poppy seed often start with “soaking the seeds”. Some recipes call for the seeds to be soaked in milk, some have you steep them in boiling water, and some just use them dry.

In order to decide if the soaking step was necessary, I soaked one batch of seeds in milk, one in boiling water and used one batch dry from the jar. Here are the results:

• The dry seeds were very crunchy and fairly bland.
• The seeds steeped in boiling water were a little softer and more flavorful than the dry seeds.
• The seeds soaked in cold milk were the softest. The milk-soaked seeds had the strongest flavor, with a distinctly peppery aftertaste which I like.