Olive Garden Inspired Lemon Cream Cake
Olive Garden Inspired Lemon Cream Cake is a light white cake with a creamy lemon, cream cheese and whipped cream filling garnished with a crumb topping. Serve chilled for a refreshing dessert.
Today I am continuing to catch up with my Easter recipes. I tried out a recipe for an Olive Garden Lemon Cream Cake. The verdict was it was very delicious, although not an exact match to Olive Garden, it was close enough to satisfy the craving.
Plan ahead to chill it for a few hours
This cake gets a better flavor the longer it chills in the fridge, soo make this ahead of time and let it chill for a few hours before serving.
Be sure to fully whip the heavy cream
I noticed a few reviews remarking that the filling was runny. Please take care to whip the heavy whipped cream until it reaches stiff peaks. If you do not beat it long enough it will cause your filling to be runny. I would recommend chilling your mixing bowl and beaters in the fridge before you beat the whipping cream. You want all of the elements to be nice and cold.
Use a cake leveler ensure even layers
A cake leveler is perfect for a recipe like this. I recommend picking one up at the store. I love mine.
You can bake the crumb topping if you prefer
The original recipe calls for raw flour to be used in the topping. You can toast the flour at 350-f degrees for 10 minutes to make it safe to eat. I haven’t tried this method out yet, but wanted to provide this option for those that are concerned about it.
Double the crumb topping if you plan on coating the sides
For simplicity I only garnished the top of the cake with the crumb topping. Less hassle for me and I didn’t mind that the sides of the cake wasn’t fully coated. If you are planning on using crumbs on the sides of the cake you should consider doubling the recipe for the crumb topping.
Olive Garden Inspired Lemon Cream Cake Recipe
Equipment
- 10-inch Cake Pan
Ingredients
Cake:
- 1 white cake mix prepared
Filling:
- 8 oz. cream cheese softened
- 2 cups powdered sugar
- 1 cup heavy whipping cream whipped to stiff peaks
- 3 tbsp. lemon juice
Crumb Topping:
- 1/2 cup all purpose flour
- 1/2 cup powdered sugar
- 1 tsp. vanilla extract
- 4 tbsp. butter
Instructions
- Prepare cake as directed in a 10″ round cake pan. Set aside to cool.
- Blend softened cream cheese, powdered sugar, and lemon juice together. In a medium bowl, whip heavy whipping cream to stiff peaks. Gently fold into cream cheese mixture and blend by hand. Chill until ready to add to the cake.
- Mix flour and powdered sugar in small bowl. Crumble butter in and dribble in vanilla extract. The crumbles should be no larger than pea size. If you have trouble crumbling mixture, chill for a few minutes. Chill until needed.
- After cake is cooled, cut in half. Spread cream cheese mixture, saving 1/2 cup, on bottom half and carefully place top layer back. Spread rest of cream cheese mixture on the sides of cake. Press crumb topping onto the top of the cake.
- Chill for 3 hours.
Nutrition
Recipe from SparkRecipes.
A few more tasty recipes for the road!
Ali this looks wonderful! I've always wanted to give this a try, since lemon is a favorite!
This looks so amazing and easy to make! Pinning to try!
Oh man I love that cake!! So good, thanks for sharing!
Great with a layer of lemon curd between the cake and the creamy mixture. Did the curd on both cake layers. Delicious! Also, added lemon zest to the creamy mixture fir some extra zing.
Sounds wonderful KjB 🙂
Making this for a third time today!!! I add lemon zest to the cake batter, looks pretty! So delicious, great recipe!!
Lemon zest makes everything better 🙂 So glad you liked it.
I have made this with the zest and the filling with a splash of lemoncello….wonderful
Wonderful idea. Limoncello is so good!
I am having a problem with the crumb topping–I don't see anywhere describing the cooking instructions. I was thinking it was a slightly crunchy topping which is what I wanted. After-all the topping does call for flour–doesn't that need to be cooked–will you illuminate me. 🙂
Step 3 is all you need to do for the topping. It isn't baked. 🙂
Is the butter hard are supposed to be melted?
hard or room temperature
Do I bake the toping and is the butter melted?
No the topping isn't baked. The butter should be chilled or room temperature, but not melted.
How do you crumble the butter? Looking forward to making this cake for our Italian themed Thanksgiving dinner on Saturday.
Cut it into small pieces and either use a fork to cut it in or use your fingertips. I would use a fork.
If you freeze the butter and then grate it like cheese
, it works as well.
Thanks so much for this tip! worked great!
This has become our family’s birthday cake! Perfect in every way…I’ge probably made it 10 times in the past few years and it NEVER disappoints!
I've made this cake several times! Everyone loves it, made it again today! I came across a different recipe, the crumble was lemon cake mix and butter. The crumble for this recipe sounds so much better!
I made a 3 layer six inch of this, so I was able to generously frost the whole thing and it was PHENOMENAL. Soo creamy and moist with just the right amount of lemon, and the crumble was great as well.
Has anyone mafe it witn 2 regular size cake pans?
Made this recipe tonight and I had to stop myself from eating the lemon cream cheese filling, it was sooo good! I did bake the crumb topping at 350F for about 15 minutes because I did not want to risk giving my kids any raw flour. I also wanted a nice crunchy topping.