Sinepuxent Receipts – Lemon Tea Cake w/ Cherry Topping

This past spring a member of my church, Peggy Tibbitt,  passed away.  No matter how bad Peggy felt, she always had a smile for me and a hug to go with it. Though she may no longer walk this earth, the memory of her will never fade with me. This past Fourth of July I wanted to fix something different and I remembered her receipt for Lemon Tea Cake.  It’s a dense cake with a wonderful butter flavor and blueberries.  I iced it with no-sugar-added cherry pie filling blended with lemon juice. I was so surprised at the number of comments about this simple little desert and decided to share it with you.

Lemon Tea Cake with Cherry Topping 

1 stick of butter, salted, room temperature

1 cup sugar

2 large eggs, room temperature

½ cup milk

1 tbsp. lemon zest

1 ½ cups bread flour

1 tsp. baking powder

½ tsp. sea salt

1 cup fresh blueberries

1 can no-sugar-added cherry pie filling

Juice of 1 lemon

Preheat oven to 325 degrees; grease and flour a 9” x 12” glass dish. In an electric mixer, cream butter and sugar together then add eggs one at a time blending well after each. Mix in the milk and lemon zest. Sift flour, salt and baking powder together and then add to wet mixture, blending well. Remove from mixer and fold in blueberries. Bake for 50 minutes. Remove from heat and cover with foil and place in freezer. Two hours before serving, remove from freezer. Blend cherry pie filling with lemon juice and spread over cake.

Tom Clarke is the author of “Sinepuxent Receipts, A Personal Collection of Eastern Shore Cooking”.  Tom lives in Hebron.  When not cooking for friends or developing new recipes (“receipts”), Tom sings in the choir at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church.  All profits from the sale of “Sinepuxent Receipts” go to the St. Peter’s Church Organ Fund.