Moist and rich vegan lemon pound cake topped with a lemon glaze. Deliciously lemony and tangy, and easy and fun to make!
Ever since making my basic vegan pound cake recipe, I have wanted to make a vegan lemon pound cake.
After doing all the heavy lifting of figuring out how to even make a pound cake when I made our basic vegan pound cake, this one was a total breeze and complete pleasure to make.
Topped with a delicious lemon glaze it is total lemony perfection.
The lemon flavor in the cake is subtle and comes from a little lemon extract and some lemon zest. The vegan buttermilk is also made with a little lemon juice.
And the frosting is a simple mix of powdered sugar, lemon juice and lemon extract.
Tenting with Foil
This cake bakes for an hour, which can lead to excessive browning on top. So the trick is to bring it out after 40 minutes and tent it with foil and then put it back in for the last 20 minutes.
So basically you wrap the whole loaf pan in foil so that there is a tent shape on top, this is so that the foil doesn’t press down on your cake from the top, but protects it from getting overly browned.
Bringing it out at the 40 minute point doesn’t effect the rise of the cake or cause any sinking effect (as it would do if you opened the oven at an earlier point) because all the rising has already happened at this stage and it’s close to done.
The cake is quite dense, which is what you want in a pound cake. It’s not super light and fluffy, but it’s not meant to be. It’s still probably lighter than a traditional pound cake, but you can see from the photos that it has a fairly tight crumb.
The moisture comes from vegan butter and homemade vegan buttermilk. The lift comes from 3 tsp of baking powder, which is the maximum amount you can use in this recipe, any more and you’d have it rising too high for the structure to support and then you get sinking in the middle.
The result is a lovely lemon loaf with delicious lemon flavor that really pops with the lemon glaze.
So if you love pound cake, then this vegan lemon pound cake will definitely not disappoint! It is:
- Super easy
- Lemony
- Moist
- Rich
- Dense (but not heavy)
- Topped with a lemon glaze
If you wanted to serve this with something else like a scoop of vegan lemon ice cream, that would be divine too! Pound cake really works well served alongside other things.
Keep it covered at room temperature where it will stay fresh for a few days or covered in the fridge where it will stay good for up to a week.
More Lemony Vegan Desserts!
- Vegan Lemon Cake
- Vegan Lemon Cupcakes
- Vegan Lemon Pie
- Vegan Lemon Cookies
- Vegan Banana Cake with Lemon Frosting
So what do you think of this vegan lemon pound cake? Let us know in the comments and please rate the recipe as well, thanks so much!
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Vegan Lemon Pound Cake
- Prep Time: 15 mins
- Cook Time: 60 mins
- Total Time: 1 hour 15 minutes
- Yield: 10
Description
Moist and rich vegan lemon pound cake topped with a lemon glaze. Deliciously lemony and tangy, and easy and fun to make!
Ingredients
For the Lemon Pound Cake:
- 1/2 cup (112g) Vegan Butter
- 1 cup (200g) White Sugar
- 1 tsp Vanilla Extract
- 2 tsp Lemon Extract
- 2 cups (250g) All Purpose Flour*
- 3 tsp Baking Powder
- 1/2 tsp Salt
- 1 cup (240ml) Vegan Buttermilk
- 2 Tbsp Lemon Zest*
For the Lemon Glaze:
- 1 cup (120g) Powdered Sugar
- 1 and 1/2 Tbsp Lemon Juice (freshly squeezed)
- 1/8 tsp Lemon Extract
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C). Spray a 9×5 inch loaf pan with non-stick spray and line it with parchment paper, letting the parchment paper hang over the sides so that the cake can be easily lifted out. Set aside.
- Add the vegan butter and white sugar to an electric mixer and cream them together. Then add in the vanilla extract and the lemon extract and mix in.
- Sift the all purpose flour into a mixing bowl and add the baking powder and salt and mix together.
- Add the dry ingredients in with the creamed butter and sugar mix.
- Prepare your vegan buttermilk by adding 1 Tbsp lemon juice into a measuring jug and then adding soy milk up to the 1 cup (240ml) line. Stir it in so it curdles. You can also use almond milk for this step if you prefer.
- Pour the vegan buttermilk in with the other ingredients and mix in with a spoon until combined, but be careful not to overmix.
- Add in the lemon zest and stir in. The batter will be thick.
- Transfer the batter into the prepared loaf pan and smooth it down evenly.
- Place into the oven and bake for 60 minutes. At the 40 minute mark, bring it out and tent the top with foil so that the foil makes a tent shape over the top, and return it to the oven for a final 20 minutes.*
- Lift the cake out with the parchment paper and place onto a wire cooling rack to cool completely before you add the lemon glaze.
- Add the powdered sugar, lemon juice and lemon extract to a bowl and stir it in until well combined. You can use an electric mixer for this if you want to, but I found it very easy to just mix it in with a spoon.
- Spoon the glaze onto the cake and spread it around the top evenly. Allow the glaze to set (if you put the cake into the fridge for 10 minutes, covered, the glaze sets very nicely) before slicing and serving.
Notes
*Weigh your flour for the most accurate/best results.
*2 Tbsp of lemon zest is what you’d get from about 2 lemons, depending on the size of the lemons of course. A large lemon might provide enough zest by itself.
*Tenting with foil stops the cake from browning too much on top.
- Category: Dessert, Cakes, Baking
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: Vegan
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 Slice (of 10)
- Calories: 278
- Sugar: 31.9g
- Sodium: 363mg
- Fat: 6g
- Saturated Fat: 1.1g
- Carbohydrates: 52.9g
- Fiber: 0.9g
- Protein: 3.3g
Keywords: vegan lemon pound cake
Love this recipe and I have made it so many times.
I didn’t have lemon extract and just added a little extra zest and juice to the recipe and it still came out really lemon-y.
★★★★★
Awesome! Thanks for sharing Madi!
I’ve used this recipe countless times but never said “thank you”. So thank you. I usually modify recipes but this one is perfect for me as it is, I just add something extra to the glaze to make it more sour candy-like. But seriously, so perfect. Thank you, thank you, thank you ToT
You’re so welcome Remina! Thanks so much for posting!
Incredible – it’s amazing! Complete vegan recipe win. We cut the pound cake loaf in half horizontally and spread on a layer of raspberry jam, which made it just perfect. Thank you for this delicious recipe.
★★★★★
Fantastic! Thanks so much Sara!
Great recipe but each time I’ve made it, my loaf caves in the middle. What could be causing this?
It can be that your oven temperature is too high so it rises too fast. I highly recommend an oven thermometer so you can check the temperature that the oven is reaching inside.
How do I make this gluten free ?
You could try it with a gluten-free all purpose flour blend, but I haven’t tried it this way so I’m not sure how well it will work.
Hii,
I made this recipe yesterday, and it was amazing. I’ve made a few recipes from your blog and they have all been phenomenal.
If I want to double this recipe, how much baking powder am I supposed to use? And will I just double the other ingredients normally?
Thank you.
So glad you enjoyed the recipe! If you double the recipe then everything will need to be doubled including the baking powder, so you would use 6 tsp. 🙂
Thank you for responding Alison. I will definitely be making it again.
★★★★★
Absolutely perfect! Wonderful flavor and texture. Tender but with a nice crisp edge! I doubled the recipe and baked it in a tube pan. So beautiful for the holidays! Thank you for another winning recipe Alison.
★★★★★
Thanks so much Sheila!
Could you add fresh blueberries to this cake?
Hi Kimberly, I think you could! I haven’t tried it myself but I think you can.
Omg, Alison, I made this cake and it was delicious. Thank you so much!
Do you have any recipes with soy curls?
★★★★★
So glad to hear that Judith! We don’t have any recipes with soy curls yet.
Hi, I’m going to make this cake but don’t have any lemons for the zest. What can I do?
You can leave it out, it will still be good without it.