Cake:
Preheat the oven to
375. Mix the flour, baking soda, baking powder, 0.25 tsp. salt,
and lemon zest. In another bowl, soften the butter in the
microwave, add the sugar, egg yolks, vanilla, and lemon juice and
mix. In a third bowl, whip egg whites with 0.25 tsp. salt until
they are stiff but not dry. Add flour to butter mixture in two
parts, alternating with yogurt. Fold in egg whites. Bake in
2 round cake pakes for about 25 minutes. While baking, make
the lemon curd.
Curd:
Whisk together the eggs,
lemon juice, and sugar. Cook over medium heat, stirring
constantly, until it begins to thicken. Pay attention --- it will
look like nothing is happening for quite a while, then it will thicken
in about ten seconds. If you're not paying attention, you'll get
lumps! Take off heat immediated and stir in butter and lemon
zest. Cool. Once cake and curd are both cool, assemble the
cake using the curd as a filling and icing.
*Mark and I wait until we see lemons
in the last chance section in the grocery store. Then we buy a
bunch, grate the zest off and freeze it, then squeeze the juice out and
use it in Mark's sweet tea. We tend to make this cake with the
bottled lemon juice, but it would be even better with fresh lemon
juice.