Lemon Polenta Cake

Submitted by -c-

One delicious lemony moist polenta cake as detailed below! I halved the original recipe that I found somewhere and tweaked, which left me with ample for one approx. 8" tin. Handily wheat and dairy free too. Gluten free if you check the baking powder, I believe.

Ingredients

 * 250g sugar (1.25 cups) + 150g for syrup (1/2 cup or so)
 * 250g margerine (or half a tub of your favourite dairy-free spread)
 * 3 eggs
 * 250g ground almonds
 * 125g fine polenta (scant 1.5 cups)
 * 3 lemons
 * 1/2 tsp salt
 * 1 tsp baking powder (1/3tsp bicarb. of soda, 2/3 cream of tartar)

I used a soft brown sugar, which seemed to work fine and has more flavour than your average white sugar. Also unwaxed lemons preferable as the zest is used. I think the "fine polenta" refers to Masa Harina, as I used actual polenta and it came out kind of.. crunchy (I hadn't realised a more finely ground cornmeal existed).

Preparation
Heat the oven to 150C (300F), and line an 8" round baking cake tin thing with baking paper. (Might want to grease it too if you like).

Directions

 * 1) Cream margerine spread and sugar together until homogenous
 * 2) Incorporate eggs
 * 3) In a separate bowl mix polenta, almonds, lemon zest (of ~half a lemon, more to taste) salt and baking powder. Gently fold in to margerine/sugar/egg mixture.
 * 4) Pour mixture into cake tin and bake for 1.5 - 2hrs. Poke with a pointy chopstick when approaching readiness to see how it's doing (should come away clean if cooked through).
 * 5) Meanwhile juice the lemons into a pan, add sugar (go easy and add to taste works well I find) and simmer gently until reduced by half and syrupy. (I've pondered adding a bit of grated ginger to it for a bit of bite, but this is yet to be tested).
 * 6) Once cake is cooked nicely, pull it out of oven and set down somewhere handy. Now make a few "boreholes" (handy chopstick to the rescue again), and gently spoon lemon syrup into them. This makes for added lemony deliciousness! Apparently it is important to do this before the cake has cooled - before it sets a little, I guess.

Let cool a little more and then sample. Voilà! One delicious lemony polenta cake!