This Italian lemon cream cake is my version of the popular one from the Cheesecake Factory. This cake has fluffy vanilla cake layers, a filling of lemon mascarpone cream, and the outside of the cake has a lemon crumb topping. Powdered sugar is dusted over the whole cake for a pretty finish.
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🍋A perfect cake for spring
This Italian lemon cream cake is perfect for spring! It has a hint of lemon flavour, so it's not too strong of a lemon flavour, like some lemon desserts. The cake is made of vanilla layers, so the lemon is just in the filling and the crumb topping.
This cake can be made in advance to make it easier. I made the cake layers in advance and froze them. I made the crumb topping and the lemon mascarpone filling the day before I wanted to serve it. Assembling the cake was very easy after everything was prepared.
If you like lemon desserts, try my lemon meringue cheesecake, lemon lovers trifle, lemon pound cake loaf or fudgy lemon brownies! All these recipes are also perfect for spring!
🥘Ingredients
Ingredient notes
- Lemon - you will only need one for this recipe.
- Whole milk - you can also use buttermilk or 2% milk.
- Unsalted butter - If you use salted butter in this recipe, leave out the additional salt.
- Mascarpone cheese - Mascarpone cheese gives this cake an authentic Italian flavour. If you can not find it, you can substitute with cream cheese.
🔪Instructions
Cake layer
In a medium bowl, whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together. Set it aside and beat butter and sugar together in a large bowl, or the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the beater attachment. Add vegetable oil and eggs, and mix to combine, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed. Slowly mix in vanilla extract and milk.
Stir dry ingredients into the cake batter and then pour the batter into two greased and parchment paper lined 8 inch cake pans. Bake at 350°F (177°C) for 25-30 minutes. Allow the cake to cool in it's pan for 5 minutes, and then turn it out onto a wired rack to cool completely.
You can make the cake layers in advance. I froze mine for 2 days before I wanted to serve the cake.
Crumb Topping
Spread flour on a parchment lined baking sheet. Bake in a preheated 350°F (177°C) for 5 minutes. This cooks out the raw taste of the flour. Let cool for a few minutes.
In a large bowl, whisk cooled flour and powdered sugar together. Using a pastry cutter, forks, or your hands, cut in cold butter into the dry ingredients. You want the butter to coat all the dry ingredients and the size to be small. We don't want big chunks on our cake.
Stir in lemon zest and vanilla, and store it in the refrigerator to get it cold, about 1 hour.
Lemon Mascarpone Cream Filling
Whip heavy whipping cream in a large bowl to stiff peaks, and set aside. In another large bowl, mix mascarpone cheese, powdered sugar, lemon zest and juice. Gently fold in whipped cream. Chill in the refrigerator until ready to use.
Assembly
Place one layer on a cake plate. Reserve ¾ cup of filling, and spread or pipe the rest of the filling on top of the cake. Place the second cake layer on top. Spread the reserved cake filling all over the top and sides of the cake.
Press crumb topping all over the tops and sides of the cake. Dust powdered sugar all over the cake. If not serving immediately, wait to dust the cake with powdered sugar. Powdered sugar will seep into the cake after awhile.
For more step by step photos, see the web story for Italian lemon cream cake.
✔️Expert tips
- Break up the steps by making the crumb topping, cake filling, and/or the cake layers ahead of time.
- While the mascarpone cheese gives this cake an authentic Italian flavour, you can substitute with cream cheese if you would like.
💭FAQs
You can freeze just the undecorated cake layers. The filling in this cake, would not freeze and thaw well. Wrap the cake layers in plastic wrap and then a layer of aluminum foil. Freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw in the refrigerator overnight and decorate the cake.
It's made of vanilla cake layers, a lemon mascarpone cheese filling, and a buttery lemon crumb topping.
Yes, because this cake has mascarpone cheese in it, it needs to be stored in the refrigerator. Take it out and leave at room temperature 2 hours before serving.
📖Related recipes
📋 Recipe
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Cheesecake Factory Italian Lemon Cream Cake
Equipment
- 2 8" round cake pans
- 1 baking tray
Ingredients
Vanilla Cake
- 3 cups all purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ cup unsalted butter room temperature
- 1 ¼ cup s granulated sugar
- ½ cup vegetable oil
- 3 large eggs room temperature
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 cup whole milk room temperature
Crumb Topping
- ½ cup all purpose flour
- ½ cup powdered sugar
- 4 tablespoons unsalted butter cold
- ½ teaspoon lemon zest
- ¼ teaspoon vanilla extract
Cake Filling
- 1 cup heavy whipping cream
- 1 cup mascarpone cheese room temperature
- 2 cups powdered sugar
- ½ teaspoon lemon zest
- 2 tablespoons lemon juice
Instructions
Vanilla Cake
- Preheat oven to 350°F (177°C). Line the bottoms of two 8 inch round cake pans with parchment paper and grease the sides.
- In a medium bowl, whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together. Set aside.
- Beat butter and sugar together in a large bowl, or the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the beater attachment. Add vegetable oil and eggs, and mix to combine, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed. Slowly mix in vanilla extract and milk until combined.
- Stir dry ingredients into the cake batter and then pour the batter into prepared cake pans. Bake for 25-30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Allow the cakes to cool in their pans for 5 minutes, and then turn out onto a wired rack to cool completely.
Crumb Topping
- Preheat oven to 350°F (177°C). Spread the flour out on a parchment lined baking sheet. Bake for 5 minutes to cook the raw taste out of the flour. Let cool for a few minutes.
- In a large bowl, whisk cooled flour and powdered sugar together. Using a pastry cutter, forks, or your hands, cut in cold butter into the dry ingredients. You want the butter to coat all the dry ingredients and the size to be small. We don't want big chunks on our cake.
- Stir in lemon zest and vanilla extract. Store in the refrigerator until the mixture gets cold, about 1 hour.
Lemon Mascarpone Cream Filling
- Whip heavy whipping cream in a large bowl to stiff peaks, and set aside.
- In another large bowl, mix mascarpone cheese, powdered sugar, lemon zest and juice. Gently fold in whipped cream. Chill in the refrigerator until ready to use.
To Assemble
- Place one cake layer on a cake plate. Reserve ¾ cup of filling, and spread or pipe the rest of the filling on top of the cake.
- Place the second cake layer on top. Spread the reserved cake filling all over the top and sides of the cake.
- Press crumb topping all over the tops and sides of the cake. Refrigerate leftovers for up to 3 days.
Notes
- Break up the steps by making the crumb topping, cake filling, and/or the cake ahead of time.
- While the mascarpone cheese gives this cake an authentic Italian flavour, you can substitute with cream cheese if you would like.
Gina
The filling is to die for, incredible, but the cake was dry and a bit crumbly. My family said it was probably supposed to be like a coffee cake (which I know isn't true) and it was "ok" the way it was but I know it should be more moist and if it was the cake would be out of this world. Only thing I did different is almond milk instead of whole milk but honestly I do this with many cake recipes and have never had an issue. I cooked for 25 it did not seem overdone. Any thoughts on why the dry/crumble problem? I'd like to do it again, the filling and topping are worth it, just got to get the cake better.
Nina
Hi Gina! Almond milk is more thick than whole milk, so I would recommend adding some water to it next time until it comes to the same consistency as milk. Let me know how it turns out!
Cindy Woolard
I made this for Easter. It was delicious. I used cream cheese because i couldnt find mascarpone.
Nina
Thanks, I hope you had a great Easter and I'm so glad cream cheese worked out for you.
Kyla
I need this cake to serve more people. What can I do to the recipe so I can use 9” or 10” cake pans ?
Nina
You can use a 9" cake pan. I wouldn't use any larger pan than that because the cake will be too thin.
Kelly Myers
Hello. I would like to make this cake but am confused with a part of the directions. It says to use two 8 inch pans, which I assume would be the two layers. But it also says in the directions to cut the cake in half horizontally. If we did that there would be 4 layers. Please tell me what I am missing. Thank you!
Nina
I used to have the recipe say to bake one cake and slice in half. I changed it to bake the two layers separately to make it easier. 🙂
Julie
Could you please clarify if you use 2 8 inch pans or one and cut cake horizontally? Recipe states 2 pans but the reviews mention one pan.
Thanks
Nina
I used two 8-inch cake pans because it's easier to bake the two layers separate than cutting one cake in half. Use whichever method is easier for you. If you make the cake in one pan, it'll will need to bake longer in the oven than my recipe says.
Diane
Is there anyway you could make this into a sheet pan cake?
Nina
I haven't tried making it into a sheet cake, but that sounds like a good idea! Let me know if you try it 🙂
Helen Perez
Yes I have made it. My daughter in law had this cake at a resort in Biloxi & loved it. Since I bake a lot she asked me to attempt it. I found this recipe; it had to be this one,. She loved it & told me it was exactly the same!
Nina
Thank you so much for sharing that! I'm so happy your daughter in law loved it!!!
Leona
Hello Nina,
Sorry , but the cake was a disappointment. it only rose 2 inches, i did not over bake it. the cake was very dry and dense. The only good part was the filling. As a footnote, I am very surprised you do not use measurements in your baking.
Nina
Hi Lenona! I recently updated the recipe. Did you use the current one, or the older one? The current recipe rises much better than the old one. I'm assuming you are talking about metric measurements? I have those on all my recipes. Just toggle from the US measurements to Metric 🙂
Tonya
I did not see anywhere in the instructions to use cake strips, can you give me more info on using them?
Nina
Hi Tonya! I like to use cake strips when baking cake layers, so they bake evenly and the cakes come out flat. To use them, you get the cake strips soaking wet. Squeeze the water out, and then place them around the outside of the cake tins. There should be a tie or something on the cake strips to hold it tight to the outside of the cake tin. Cake strips are not necessary though. I hope this helps 🙂
Tonya
Thanks!
Whitney Rook
My new favorite cake-scrumptious!
Nina
Thanks so much Whitney 🙂
Beth Barry
Oh my this is so good!! It’s just perfect; moist with a light creamy lemon flavor.
Nina
Thanks for the great review Beth! 🙂
Gail
recipe seems to be missing some important direction of the cake itself. there is no direction as to what consistency the batter should be. I ended up with way to much crumb topping.
overall the taste was good.
Nina
Hi Gail, I rewrote the recipe for this cake and halved the crumb topping. I hope you try it again. 🙂
Sophia
Made all the parts, everything turned out great, tasted great. Went to assemble and the filling is WAAAAAAY too thin to hold any cake up let alone the crumb coating. I made everything ahead of time so it was all chilled for hours. The top layer immediately pushed the filling out and they slid apart and wouldn’t stay ontop of each other. Then I tried to just coat it and put crumbs on and the crumbs just fell off as the filling continued to just pour everywhere. I ended up putting everything in a bowl so I wouldn’t waste it. It will taste great but I think you need more powdered sugar in your filling (and yes I did whip it to very stiff peaks, and my mascarpone was room temp when mixing and I didn’t over mix).
Nina
Hi Sophia, I'm not sure what went wrong and I haven't heard of any issues with the filling being too think before. I hope you try it again. 🙂
Nancy Priest
very disappointed with your recipe. cake was tough and crumb topping would not stay on sides. cake filling was delicious. money I spent when down the drain.
thankyou
Nina
Hi Nancy! I'm so sad to hear that it didn't turn out for you! I haven't had any reviews about the cake being tough before. Did you overmix? overbake? There's many reasons why it could turn out like that. I'm not sure why the crumb topping wouldn't adhere to the sides for you. Did you spread the cream filling onto the sides of the cake? The crumb topping won't adhere to the cake without the cream filling to act like "glue."
Nancy Priest
I have small family. Cannot consume cake in 3-4 days.can i refrigerate little longer or freeze?
Nina
Hi Nancy! Cut the cake up in slices and wrap each slice up well. Put all the wrapped up slices in an air tight container and freeze them. Cakes will dry up in the refrigerate.
Thomas Jensen
I believe this is the best cake I've ever made. Thank you for a wonderful recipe.
Nina
Thank you so much for the wonderful review Thomas! 🙂
Cindy
This looks yummy. I am thinking about using lemon curd in the center and the filling on top and sides. Think it will work? Thank you!!
Nina
Hi Cindy! Lemon curd filling sounds so good! Just make sure to pipe a border so the lemon curd doesn't seep out of the sides of the cake. Let me know how it goes 🙂
Joanna
Hello! I’m planning to make this recipe tomorrow. When switching between metric and US customary I noticed the measurement for the lemon zest in the crumb changes (1tsp in metric v. 1/2 tsp in US). Which is correct? Thank you!
Nina
Hi Joanna! It should read 1 teaspoon of lemon zest.
Lynn
Lemon flavouring is not strong enough. You can barely taste it
Nina
Hi Lynn! Sorry you wished there was a stronger lemon flavour. I would suggest using lemon cake layers next time 🙂
jeannie sheehy
can you use cake flour instead of regular flour?
Nina
Hi Jeannie! You can use cake flour in this recipe for sure!