Vegan Lemon Pound Cake with Lemon Glazing
This easy vegan lemon pound cake is a moist and light vegan cake with tangy lemon flavors and a sweet thick layer of lemon icing.
If you enjoy pound cakes, this is the easiest vegan pound cake ever to celebrate springtime.

Lemon lovers, this lemon pound cake has your name on it! A moist, light breakfast bread that will remind you of Starbucks’ but this one is 100% plant-based.
It’s similar to my Orange Pound Cake, but with a perfect lemon twist!
Are Classic Lemon Pound Cakes Vegan?
No, authentic lemon pound cake recipes are not vegan-friendly as they contain many eggs and butter.
Luckily, it’s very easy to make your own lemon vegan pound cake at home using plant-based ingredients.
How To Make Vegan Lemon Pound Cake
This vegan lemon pound cake recipe is a simple vegan cake for beginners.
All you have to do is gather simple ingredients and combine the dry ingredients with the wet ingredients.
The batter takes just 10 minutes to prepare.
Measuring Ingredients
I love to measure all my ingredients into small bowls before starting a recipe. Even if this lemon pound cake is super easy and straightforward to make, it requires quite a few ingredients.
So preparation is the key to avoiding mistakes!
Ingredients
These are the ingredients you need:
- Soy milk – or any plant-based milk you have at home, like almond milk or oat milk.
- Freshly-squeezed lemon juice – or bottled lemon juice.
- Lemon zest – make sure you are using untreated lemons to avoid pesticide contamination.
- Dairy-free coconut yogurt – or any plant-based yogurt you love, like almond yogurt or soy yogurt.
- Melted vegan butter – light olive oil works as well.
- Lemon extract
- Vanilla extract
- All-purpose flour – you can use a gluten-free all-purpose flour blend as well. Ensure that your blend contains gum, or you will have to add 1/2 teaspoon of guar gum to the batter.
- Sugar – I used unrefined cane sugar. Other options are coconut sugar, watch out the cake will be very brown in color, or sugar-free crystal sweeteners like erythritol or xylitol work as well for a vegan sugar-free cake.
- Baking powder
- Baking soda
- Salt
Preparing The Vegan Buttermilk
First, prepare the vegan buttermilk by combining soy milk and lemon juice.
Set aside for 5 minutes until the milk curdles. This step adds an extra-moist texture to this vegan lemon pound cake.
Combining The Remaining Ingredients
In another mixing bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
Pouring dry ingredients into the wet ingredients
In another large mixing, whisk together the vegan buttermilk prepared in step 1 with lemon zest, vanilla extract, lemon extract, melted vegan butter, and sugar.
Then, pour the dry ingredients, half of it at a time, whisking between each addition to gently incorporate and avoid lumps.
Don’t over-whisk the batter, or the pound cake will be dense and gummy.
Baking
Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°c). Line a 9-inch x 5-inch pound cake pan with oiled parchment paper.
Pour the pound cake batter into the pan and bake on the center rack of the oven for 50-65 minutes.
After 40 minutes, add a piece of foil on top of the bread to avoid browning the top too fast.
Insert a pick in the center of the cake to check the baking.
When the pick comes out clean or with almost no crumb on it, the vegan lemon pound cake is cooked through.
Cooling Down
Remove the lemon loaf from the pan pulling the hanging pieces of parchment paper and transfer onto a cooling rack.
Cool completely on a cooling rack at room temperature. It takes about 3 hours to reach room temperature, and you must wait that time before glazing or slicing your lemon pound cake.
Making The Lemon Glaze
First, make sure that the lemon pound cake is at room temperature. In fact, adding glazing to a lukewarm cake melts the glazing.
It gets absorbed by the batter and won’t set on top of the pound cake.
Next, combine the ingredients below into a small mixing bowl. If your glaze is too runny to your liking, add more powdered sugar, 1 tablespoon at a time.
- Powdered sugar – or powdered erythritol for a sugar-free recipe.
- Fresh lemon juice
- Soy milk or non-dairy milk of choice.
- Lemon extract if desired – totally optional, but it enhances the lemon flavor of the glazing.
Use a tablespoon to drizzle the lemon glaze all over the top of the pound cake. If you want thicker glazing, double the recipe.
Place the pound cake in the fridge for 1 hour to set the glazing.
Storage Instructions
Vegan baking recipes store very well at room temperature in a sealed container for 3-4 days.
Another option is to place the container in the fridge to make it last up to 5 days.
Finally, you can also freeze the lemon pound cake slices and thaw the slice at room temperature the day before serving.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I Add Blueberries?
Of course, you can add 1 cup of fresh blueberries into the batter to make a vegan lemon blueberry pound cake.
Blueberry and lemon are the best combos of flavors!
However, to prevent the blueberries from sinking to the bottom of the loaf pan, mix them with 1 tablespoon of corn starch before adding them to the batter.
Allergy Swaps
This is an egg-free lemon pound cake recipe, and therefore, it requires starchy flour to keep its shape.
It means that you can’t make this recipe using coconut flour or almond flour.
Other plant-based flours that you can use to swap wheat flour are:
- White whole wheat flour – swap with the same amount.
- Spelt flour
- All-purpose gluten-free flour blend containing gum.
- Oat flour – only partially. Swap only 1/2 cup of the regular flour for oat flour.
More Vegan Cake Recipes
I love to bake vegan bread and cakes for breakfast. Below I listed some other vegan fruit bread recipes for you to try:
Made this vegan lemon pound cake? Share a review or comment below. I love to hear your feedback on my recipes,
Your friend, Carine
Vegan Lemon Pound Cake
Ingredients
- 1 cup Soy Milk - or almond milk
- ¼ cup Lemon Juice
- 2 cups All-Purpose Flour
- 2 teaspoons Baking Powder
- ¼ teaspoon Baking Soda
- ½ teaspoon Salt
- ⅓ cup Coconut Yogurt - or any dairy-free yogurt you like
- ¾ cup Unrefined Cane Sugar - or erythritol if sugar-free
- 1 tablespoon Lemon Zest
- ½ cup Melted Vegan Butter (Unsalted) - or light olive oil
- ½ teaspoon Lemon Extract
- ½ teaspoon Vanilla Extract
Lemon glazing
- 1 cup Icing Sugar
- 1 ½ tablespoon Lemon Juice
- 1 tablespoon Soy Milk - or almond milk
- ¼ teaspoon Lemon Extract - Optional
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F(180°C). Line a 9-inch x 5-inch loaf pan with oiled parchment paper. Set aside.
- In a large mixing bowl, prepare the vegan 'buttermilk. Combine soy milk and lemon juice and set aside 10 minutes until the milk curdle.
- In another mixing bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
- Bring back the bowl with the vegan 'buttermilk' prepared in step 1 and whisk in coconut yogurt, unrefined cane sugar, lemon zest, melted vegan butter, lemon extract, and vanilla extract.
- Add the dry ingredients to the liquid ingredients and combine until smooth and no lumps show. Don't over mix the batter, or the pound cake will be heavy or gummy.
- Transfer the pound cake batter into the loaf pan.
- Bake for 50-65 minutes or until a pick inserted in the center of the loaf comes out clean. You can tent the loaf pan with a large piece of foil after 40 minutes of baking to prevent the top of the pound cake from browning too fast.
- Cool the pound cake on a cooling rack for 3 hours before glazing.
Lemon glazing
- When the loaf is at room temperature, prepare the lemon glazing.
- In a small mixing bowl, stir powdered sugar, lemon juice, soy milk, and lemon extract. The glazing must be thick and glossy. If it's too runny to your liking, stir in 1-2 extra tablespoons of powdered sugar.
- Drizzle the lemon glazing on the top of the vegan lemon pound cake.
- Place the pound cake in the fridge for 1 hour to set the glazing.
Storage
- Store the pound cake in a sealed cake box for up to 5 days in the fridge or freeze the slices in an airtight container and thaw the day before eating.
I made this using authentic Greek fat free yogurt (I’m not vegan, and this is form of dairy I can actually tolerate as long as it’s fat free and not “Greek style” yogurt), skipped the lemon zest (I don’t like it), and just used lemon juice instead of lemon extract (which I didn’t have). This was delicious, despite all of my modifications. It just goes to show, this is a solid recipe that can work even when someone like me (with weird dietary and taste preferences) messes around with it. Thank you for a wonderful starting point.
Hey yall . This is my third time making this vegan cake because the first time smh…. I saw the tbsp and tsp all wrong. Needless to say the first one tasted like baking soda (go back and read why). Now that second and this third one. Is for the WIN. Going to this family pot luck busting the door down. My 10 year old son say mom you out did yourself. Folks I’m from the South and that simply meant the cake was GOOD (slamming). Now I’m going to search for a strawberry pound cake from this same PLANT KITCHEN.
Thank you the conscious PLANT KITCHEN❣
Made this recipe today, using olive oil instead of butter and it was fantastic. Also added about a half teaspoon of tumeric to the wet ingrediants and the little ones loved the fun highlighter yellow color it gave it haha.
Turned out really well. Only thing I’d say is my lemon extract has a strong alcohol smell so it kind of ruined the frosting. Wish I had left that out.
Also, would coconut oil work too?
Yes, melted coconut oil would work!
Question: Could you use cake flour for this?
Yes, it would work!
is it a must to use unrefined cane sugar or can I use regular sugar. I also have Monk Fruit sugar replacement.
Can this cake be frozen? I am using it to make a Sicilian cake with sweet vegan ricotta filling. It’s easier to cut in layers when it is frozen Thank you
Any granulated sweetener works including sugar or blend of erythritol monk fruit. You can freeze leftover in airtight box and thaw the day before at room temperature.
I’m having a hard time finding a vegan yogurt that doesn’t have any soy or made in a soy factory . Will this recipe work by using unsweetened coconut cream instead ?
Coconut cream will work very well, I would scoop out the hard top part from a can of coconut cream
Hi, you think I can use earth balance butter on this recipe?
Sure!
I followed the recipe exactly and it came out so good…moist and lemony. I will definitely be making it again.
Very easy to follow instruction and it’s delicious!
Awesome recipe. Make sure to not over mix the batter
Thank you for this recipe. I will let you no when I make. It looks so Delicious.
Thank you for sharing.
Thanks, hope you love it!
It looks amazing! How do you think, is it possible to use coconut cream instead of yogurt?)
it will come out perfect, great ideas
This taste really great but how can I increase height and decrease density?!!
It shouldn’t be dense, unless you overmix it.
Please disregard my reply because I had not seen the part about mixing a little at a time as to avoid lumps.
You can sift the flour over the liquid ingredients, it make bread lighter and avoid lumps for sure. Enjoy!
what can i use instead of yogurt? will applesauce work? I dont want to use sour cream either
I used dairy-free yogurt only in this recipe, I didn’t try something else, feel free to experiment with applesauce or more almond milk/soymilk maybe
Quick easy will see how it tastes now I’ll be back
I Think This Recipe Is Awesome! Thanks.
Hello Carine,
Thanks for all your nice recipes. Truly an inspiration!
A weird question maybe:
could I replace all (fresh)things lemon with (blood)orange. Just happen to have an abundance of those, but no lemons in the pantry…
Thanks!
Sure! it will be delicious too. Enjoy!
I haven’t tried it as yet but it looka so good and I plan to try it soon.
Can this recipe be doubled and baked in a Bundt pan?
I didn’t try that but it should work yes!
Hi, does it have to be soy or almond milk?
Any non-dairy milk work here