Meyer Lemon Loaf

I love lemon!!  Shouting it from the mountaintops...  or maybe just from the keys of my keyboard.   When I visited my grandmother and her husband "Papa Lou", my kids call him, in Florida a few weeks ago, he made his lemon salad.  It is made with meyer lemons and it is so good.  I will be posting that later... but I had this pack of gorgeous meyer lemons I bought at good ole Sam's, and couldn't let all that good zest go to waste.  Plus, I had some that were so juicy, I had to bake with it!

 I saw a meyer lemon bread on Pinterest a few days back, and thought it looked interesting.  I love lemon bread, and wanted to try the recipe.  However, I was too lazy, looked a few recipes and came up with this one out of those.  The loaf was so tender, almost like a cake crumb.  And the glaze, OH! the glaze.  Let's just say I was eating by the spoonful.  There is one slice of this bread left, which unfortunately I have to save for my husband.  Or I could eat all the evidence and pretend it never was...  hmm...  If you like lemon, this loaf will be gone by evening.

MEYER LEMON LOAF

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/4 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 cup sugar
• 3 eggs
• 1 stick butter, softened
• 1/3 cup buttermilk
• zest of 3 meyer lemons
• 1/2 tsp vanilla
• 1/2 tsp. lemon extract (I will use 1 tsp. next time)
• juice of 2 meyer lemons

GLAZE:

• juice of 1 meyer lemon
• zest of 1 meyer lemon
• 1 cup powdered sugar
• 1/2 tsp lemon extract
• 1 TBSP melted butter
• 2 tsp. milk

DIRECTIONS:
Preheat oven to 350 and spray bread pan with baking spray, or butter and flour pan.  Whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt.  In a separate bowl, working with hand mixer, beat together butter and sugar for about a minute.  Add eggs, zest, juice and extracts.  (May curdle, don't worry, to be expected) Beat well.  Add buttermilk and beat. Add dry ingredients and mix until smooth and thickens a little, 30 seconds to a minute. 

Terrible picture, but I love how you can see all the lemon zest bits!

Pour into prepared pan and bake in the middle of oven for 40-50 minutes, or until toothpick comes out clean.  Let sit on wire rack for about 10 minutes and carefully remove from pan.  (Loosen sides with knife and shake pan from side to side to loosen bread).  Let cool about 15-20 minutes, and prepare glaze.  Melt butter, add extract, zest and lemon juice and whisk it sugar.  Add milk 1 tsp at a time, whisking, until ribbons for when you lift the whisk out.  You want it thick.  Pour over the bread and lick the spoon. Let set another 10 minutes so the icing will set a bit and enjoy!!