Glazed Meyer Lemon Bread

I had to buy some Meyer Lemons the other day. They were still in season and I was inspired to try out some other recipes other than a Meyer Lemons and Ginger Gelato that I'd made some time last year. Meyer Lemons are more like oranges with lemony tones than "pure" lemons. I like it! It's different! And since it's late in the season (I think), the Meyer Lemons looked more like oranges rather than lemons too! It was weird, I had to keep looking at the tags to make sure that I was getting the right thing.

Brought them home and started looking around for some easy to do recipes. Decided on a Lemon Bread(which I made into Meyer Lemon Bread instead) that I had previously gotten from a website. The recipe sounded good and easy to make. The recipe made two mini loaves which I gave one away to a family friend (whom I hope likes lemons!! coz it was rather lemony). Overall, I love the result and I think I'm gonna to twist the recipe a little to see how it goes. :)

Glazed Meyer Lemon Bread recipe

Ingredients
1 2/3 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons (packed) grated lemon peel
1/2 cup whole milk
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice

Method
Preheat oven to 350°F. Lightly butter 8 1/2x4 1/2x2 1/2-inch loaf pan. Stir flour, baking powder and salt in medium bowl to blend. Using electric mixer, beat 1 cup sugar and butter in large bowl until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs 1 at a time. Add grated lemon peel. Mix in dry ingredients alternately with milk. Pour batter into prepared loaf pan. Bake until tester inserted into center of bread comes out clean, about 1 hour.

Meanwhile, combine remaining 1/2 cup sugar and fresh lemon juice in small heavy saucepan and stir over low heat until sugar dissolves.

Transfer lemon bread to rack. Gradually spoon lemon glaze over hot bread, adding more as glaze is absorbed. Cool lemon bread completely in pan on rack. (Can be prepared 1 day ahead. Turn bread out onto rack. Cover with plastic wrap and let stand at room temperature.)

Note: I increased the amount of zest used as I like mine to have more of the lemon flavor, the original was rather weak. I used the total of 4 medium Meyer Lemon zest instead. Also I added some lemon juice in the batter as well.
I also decreased the 1 cup of sugar for the batter to 3/4 cup of sugar since I was going to glaze the bread, I didn't want it to be too sweet and kill the whole lemon flavor.
And as for the glaze, I used powdered sugar and lemon juice and simply stir them to the right consistency and taste as I went along so make sure that it's not too tart nor too sweet. The glaze after mixing should be able to coat the back of a spoon but still have excess glaze running off it. I also poke some holes in the bread so that the glaze would be able to run through the whole thing instead of just remaining on the top of it. Finally I also added extra zest in the glaze before glazing the bread.

Verdict: The bread had the texture like that of the pound cake without all the pound of butter in it. It wasn't too sweet either which was good. I think I would have reduced the amount of glaze used, I thought it was a little too much. It was defnitely zesty!! If you don't want it to be too "lemony", don't use the zest in the glaze, my husband thought it was a little of an overkill! Oh well.....:D