Lemon Cherry Delicious

It's cold. You have a lot of lemons leftover. Lemon delicious is the answer to all you problems!! I have to admit, I am completely in love with this recipe. Anything with a golden top, fluffy middle and gooey, saucy bottom is a winner in my books. The addition of cherries gives it some colour and tang and I think it was even better than a regular lemon delicious.

Lemon Cherry Delicious
(Adapted from this Gourmet Traveller recipe)
1 cup (220 g) caster sugar
90 g unsalted butter, softened
2 lemons, finely grated rind and juice
3 eggs, separated
120 g self-raising flour
3 cups (750 ml) milk
1/2 cup cherry jam
To serve: pure icing sugar and pouring cream (Optional)

Preheat oven to 180 degrees C. Beat sugar, butter and lemon rind with an electric mixer until pale and fluffy, then add egg yolks, beating well after each addition. Add flour and milk alternately in batches and beat well until a smooth batter forms. Add citrus juices and beat until just combined.

In a separate bowl, whisk eggwhites with a pinch of salt until stiff peaks form, fold one third of the eggwhites through batter to lighten, add remaining eggwhites and fold in until just combined. Divide mixture among six 1¼ cup-capacity buttered ovenproof dishes (I used lots of little ramekins), and drop blobs of cherry jam over the tops, or swirl into the mixture.

Place in a deep roasting pan and pour in enough hot water to come halfway up sides of dishes. Bake until puffed and golden (30-35 minutes). Dust generously with icing sugar and serve immediately with cream.

A was his usual blunt self and said the cherry bits looked like wounds. Yeah thanks. I do see what he means though. But please don't let that put you off, the cherry bits go so well with the sweet lemon pudding! Some icing sugar dusted on top will get rid of any 'wounds'. I just always forget to dust off the tops with icing sugar because they smell so good that I impatiently dug into them as soon as they came out of the oven! Anyway, A shut up as soon as he tucked into one of these, he loved them.

The best part is all the different textures you get throughout it. It's very wet down the bottom, like a self-saucing pudding, and the lemon sauce goes so well with that crisp top. I may have left mine in for a liiiittle bit too long so you can see some of them got a bit brownie than I would have liked. I was surprised by how many serves I got out of this recipe, I ran out of ramekins. It's a light, heart-warming dessert which is sure to please any lemon lover.