The Best Pistachio Lemon Cake with Lemon Frosting!!

Hello everyone and welcome back to my kitchen! Today, I wanted to share with you a delightful and delicious cake that's perfect for springtime occasions! We'll be making my lemon pistachio cake with delicate pistachio cake layers and a lemony frosting! The combination of pistachio and lemon are a match made in heaven, and you are going to love the combination of textures and flavors! We're going to start by making the lemon pistachio cake layers with lots of lemon zest and diced pistachios folded into the batter. Once the cake layers are baked and cooled, we'll make a zesty, lemony, cream cheese frosting. Add a generous amount of that in between each cake layer and on the outside. Garnish the cake with diced pistachios and some lemon slices. Not only is this cake absolutely stunning, it's also incredibly delicious! For the full list of ingredients and the printable instructions, head on down into that video description box and over to my website. And now, let's make this incredible cake! I'm preheating my oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit, and today I'm going to be using three 8-inch cake pans. And I've lined the bottoms with parchment paper. You can also just spray the inside with a non-stick baking spray. We're going to set these aside and get started on the batter. We'll need one and a half cups of white granulated sugar. Place that into a large mixing bowl. And then, we're going to combine that with the zest of two large lemons. And then, use your fingers to blend the lemon zest with the sugar, and this will help release some of those aromatic lemon oils into the sugar. Next, we'll split these lemons that we just zested in half, and we'll squeeze out the lemon juice. We need half a cup of freshly squeezed lemon juice for this recipe. To our sugar and lemon zest, make sure we'll add in one cup of melted, unsalted butter. Pour in that freshly squeezed lemon juice. Add in four large eggs at room temperature, one cup of sour cream or Greek yogurt, one teaspoon of vanilla extract, and one teaspoon of lemon extract. Mix this all together. For the dry ingredients, we'll need three cups of all-purpose flour, one teaspoon of baking soda, two teaspoons of baking powder, and a quarter teaspoon of sea salt. Toss that all together. Sift the dry ingredients into the wet batter, and then mix just until the dry ingredients are well incorporated. And last, we'll add in one and a half cups of finely ground pistachios. I just placed these into a food processor, pulsed them for about a minute, and you have this nice, finely ground mixture with some of the little chunks still remaining. Drop that into your batter, and then use a spatula to fold this all together. And then divide the cake batter evenly between the three pans. I like to use a kitchen scale for accuracy, so that each cake layer is nice and even. Use an offset spatula to spread the cake batter evenly to the edges of the pan. This will give you nice, even cake layers. And our lemon pistachio cake layers are ready for the oven! They're going to bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for about 22 to 24 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Once they're done baking, let them cool in the pans for about five minutes, and then transfer the cake layers onto a wire rack to cool completely. Once they're completely cooled, we'll make our lemon cream cheese frosting and put together this beautiful cake! For our lemon frosting, we'll start with two cups of softened, unsalted butter. I just took these out, let them soften at room temperature. I'm going to drop them into my mixer bowl with the flat beater attached, and I'm going to beat the butter all by itself for about eight to ten minutes, until it's really fluffy and creamy. Once the butter is nice and creamy, we're going to drop in two eight ounce packages, so 16 ounces total of softened cream cheese. And we're going to combine the cream cheese and the butter together. Just mix it for about four to five minutes, until you have a really creamy and smooth mixture. Make sure to scrape the sides of that mixing bowl. And to add lots of lemon flavor to our frosting, we're going to start with the zest of one large lemon. Add about one and a half teaspoons of lemon extract, a teaspoon of vanilla extract, a quarter teaspoon of sea salt, and we'll start adding in our powdered sugar. We need about four to five cups of powdered sugar. I'm going to start by adding a couple cups in, and then I'll add the rest later. Start out on the slow speed and mix for about a minute. Add in the remaining powdered sugar. I'm going to turn the mixer to a medium high and beat for about four to six minutes, until I have a really fluffy and creamy frosting. Once your cake layers are completely cooled, you want to use a long serrated knife to level off the top of the cake, so when you assemble the cake, it'll be nice and even. Just start at one edge, go around, and you could snack on these cake tops while you're putting together the cake! Next, I'm going to use a pastry brush and lightly soak the cake layers with some milk. You can also use some simple syrup if you want some extra sweetness, and this will keep the cake layers nice and moist. To assemble the cake, we're going to add a generous amount of this lemon cream cheese frosting in between the cake layers. Use an offset spatula, spread it evenly to the edges. This frosting is just so creamy and dreamy, it really complements the pistachio lemon cake layers. Add the second cake layer, make sure it's nicely centered. Next, you want to apply a crumb coat layer of frosting on the outside, and this layer of frosting will help seal in all the crumbs. Once we have it nicely covered, place the cake into the fridge for about 20 to 30 minutes, let it chill, and we'll come back to add our final layer of frosting. And while you're chilling your cake, you can also place the bowl of frosting into the fridge too, so the frosting doesn't get too soft. Alright, let's add this final layer on the outside! Nice generous layer, make sure you seal in all the edges. Next, I wanted to garnish the cake with a little bit of finely ground pistachios, and let's sprinkle some of these ground pistachios on the top too. I transferred my remaining frosting into a pastry bag, tipped with a simple round tip. We're going to add little dollops of the cream cheese frosting on top. And let's finish garnishing the cake with little lemon wedges. You can also use candied lemon for this step. And now, let's cut into this stunning cake, so you can see what it looks like on the inside! Use a sharp serrated knife, make sure you're slicing all the way through. And check out this gorgeous slice of pistachio lemon cake! Doesn't that look incredible? And that's it for my lemon pistachio cake! I love how beautiful this cake turned out with the finely ground pistachios on the outside, and those cute little lemon wedges on the top! This cake is going to be fantastic for any spring or summertime occasions! And now, let's dig in to enjoy! Don't forget to head on down into that video description box for the recipe link. I'll have all the details up on my website for you, including this recipe with metric measurements. Let's get a little bit of that frosting, some of this incredible cake! This frosting has the most amazing consistency! So creamy! This cake is just wow! It's simply heavenly! That combination of that creamy lemon cream cheese frosting, combined with a delicate lemon pistachio cake layers, is out of this world amazing! You are going to love the flavors and the textures! I just can't get enough of this incredible flavor combination, the lemon with the pistachio! This is going to be a fantastic cake for Easter, Mother's Day, or any springtime occasion! Thank you so much for watching my latest episode! I hope you enjoy this incredible cake for your next occasion, and I'll see you next time with a new recipe!