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The perfect gluten free lemon pudding cakes: light and lemony, tart and tangy cakes with a pudding-like texture. Spring perfection!
Table of Contents
These gluten free lemon pudding cakes remind me a bit of this self-saucing gluten free chocolate pudding cake. But light and lemony and tart and tangy.
Lemon sugar is nothing more than lemon zest ground up with granulated sugar, but I swear it makes the whole house smell like a dream. It just smells like spring to me. Even when it's winter. (I do know it's spring as I write this, but maybe when you are reading it, it's winter!).
I know that it can be a bit of a pain to bake something in a water bath, but it really helps these little soufflés bake up slowly and evenly. That way, you get a cake with a pudding-like texture. And the method is easy. If you'd prefer a classic gluten free lemon cake, we of course have that recipe too!
Even though this is not much of a make-ahead sort of deal, you could blend up most of the ingredients ahead of time, and just whip and fold in the beaten egg whites right before you're ready to bake and serve. I really like to serve these little cakes warm with a light dusting of confectioners' sugar, but they are also fabulous with a dollop of whipped cream. Then again, what isn't? Sometimes, when my children are driving me particularly crazy, I dollop them with whipped cream, and then we all feel better.
Gluten Free Lemon Pudding Cakes
Equipment
- 6 6- to 8-ounce ovensafe ramekins or jars
- Casserole dish
- Blender
- Handheld mixer or stand mixer fitted with whisk attachment
Ingredients
- Zest of 1 lemon
- ¾ cup (150 g) granulated sugar
- ¼ cup (2 fluid ounces) freshly squeezed lemon juice, (1 large lemon is usually enough)
- 3 (150 g (weighed out of shell)) eggs , at room temperature, separated
- 1 cup (8 fluid ounces) milk, at room temperature
- 2 tablespoons (28 g) unsalted butter, at room temperature
- ½ cup (70 g) gum-free gluten free flour blend, (46 g superfine white rice flour + 15 g potato starch + 9 g tapioca starch/flour)
- ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
- Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 350°F.
- Grease 6 small (about 6-ounce) oven-safe jars or ramekins and place them in a large pan with at least 2-inch sides. Fill the pan with water that reaches about 1-inch up the sides of the greased jars or ramekins. Set the pan aside.
- In a blender, place the lemon zest and granulated sugar.
- Blend until the zest is fully integrated into the sugar, and is very fragrant.
- Add 3 tablespoons of the lemon juice (reserving the final tablespoon), egg yolks (set the whites aside), milk, butter, flour blend and salt, and blend until the mixture is smooth. It will be a relatively thin liquid. Set the carafe of the blender aside while you beat the egg whites.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment (or a large bowl with a handheld mixer), place the egg whites. Beat on medium speed until the egg whites become frothy.
- Add the remaining tablespoon lemon juice, and continue to beat on medium-high speed until stiff (but not dry) peaks form. The addition of the remaining tablespoon of lemon juice to the egg whites as they beat creates fluffier and more stable whipped egg whites.
- Slowly pour the blender mixture of the other ingredients along the side of the bowl of whipped egg whites, and carefully fold the mixture in to the egg whites until few if any white streaks remain.
- Divide the mixture among the prepared jars or ramekins in the water bath. It will be very pourable.
- Open the preheated oven and pull the lower rack out about half way.
- Carefully place the pan on the rack, and pour about another inch of water into the pan to bring the water bath a total of about 2-inches up the sides of the jars or ramekins.
- Push the oven rack all the way, close the door and bake until the cakes are puffed and very pale golden (about 35 minutes).
- Remove the pan from the oven, and transfer the cakes to a wire rack to cool for about 10 minutes before dusting lightly with confectioners’ sugar and serving warm.
- The cakes can be covered and stored in the refrigerator, but they will shrink a bit as they chill in the refrigerator.
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
How would you make this dairy-free? We have dairy, soy, and coconut allergies in my house, and it would be a sin not to try this :( (Love your cookbook, btw!!! My kids have been begging for apple cake recently… :P)
I haven’t tested this recipe with any substitutions, Liz, so I don’t know! The recipe indicates that any sort of milk will work, provided it is not nonfat, and the butter is the only dairy. If you have a go-to dairy free butter sub, try that!
Sweet, thanks Nicole :)
Do you recommend a substitute for sugar, that won’t have an artifical taste? I need to have low glycemic sugars right now
Marie, I’m afraid that I don’t care for xylitol or stevia or any of those sort of sugar substitutes at all and I can’t imagine they would work in this recipe. Coconut palm sugar is a great low glycemic sugar, but I don’t know if it would work in this recipe, as I haven’t tried it.
Can you use self raising flour instead – sounds yummy?
No, Annette. There are no chemical leaveners in this recipe.
This has to be one of the prettiest foods I have ever seen. And I am not prone to hyperbole; I mean it! So fluffy and gorgeous.
Thanks, Donia! I have to say, I don’t think I’ve ever heard you say that before, so I’ll take it in the spirit in which it is offered!
Would a larger number of 8 oz ramekins work for this recipe? I don’t have enough jars, but I have a lot of ramekins from the time I was obsessed with honey-rum soaked sponge cakes from my Cuban cuisine cookbook.
They would be fine in 8 ounce ramekins, Stephanie. I’d recommend filling them about halfway full, and you’ll probably get 4 or 5 out of the deal. They might take a few minutes longer to bake, but in the water bath a few minutes here or there isn’t going to do much damage either way.
Not only must i now purchase ramikins to make this (likeNOW) I can’t wait to figure out a chocolate version. It just sounds like the perfect kind of almost pudding/almost cake thing that all girls need at certain times in the month. Gah. Dying. I won’t share. Just hand over the spoon.
There is already a chocolate version on the blog- just use the search function. I haven’t gotten around to it yet, but it looks very good.
Thanks, Michelle! Actually, you’re probably thinking of the self-saucing chocolate pudding cakes. Those are different. I’m working on a chocolate version of these little pudding cakes. :)
Thank for this- I can’t wait to make it!! It’s is definitely spring here- more like summer really, as it’s been near 90. The lemon will be so refreshing.
Michelle! This one’s for you. :)
These look sooooo good! Do you think they would work with stevia or xilitol? Trying to keep my family away from refined sugar as much as possible.
Try low glycemic coconut sugar. By weight.
Good idea, Shannon. Michelle, stevia or xylitol would not work in this. They’re just not 1:1 sugar replacements. You’d really need a recipe formulated for one of those.
These look sooo divine. I can’t wait to make them when we get back. I’m so happy to leave this MN winter behind because we didn’t get the memo that it’s spring. Annoyed.
So unfair, Jennifer! When we don’t get the in-between seasons on time, we end up just jumping right from one extreme to another. It makes me kind of ragey.
“Ohhhhhh . . .” That’s what I said (out loud, alone in my house) when I read the title of this one! It may take me a year and a day to get them made, but I am going to love these babies! A water bath can be a wonderful tool, especially if you, say, put a lemon pudding cake to bake early in the morning but forget to turn the oven off before you leave for work. Keeps you from burning down the house. Just ask Hilma!! It is spring here, so the calendar says, but there is fresh snow on the ground this morning. I refuse to look out the window. Hope you enjoy your spring day!
Oh no she did NOT, Anneke! Did she really? Well, then. Water bath as fire insurance, then! I love it when I get to see a comment from you, my friend, first thing in the morning. :)
She did! You may find this hard to believe, but when my parents got married, my mom could not boil water. My dad had to teach her to cook! She was so proud of making that pudding, and came home to a caramelized mess, but no burned out kitchen, so that is something. She’s come a long way! I love to see your posts first thing in the morning, even when I don’t comment. It is hard to start my day until I have heard from you! :)
I am shocked, Anneke. Shocked! ;)
I think outside says it’s still winter Anneke. I’m so disgusted with the white stuff.