Do you have fruit that is about to go bad? This recipe will help you turn it into a muffin-cake type thing in no time. It is #vegetarian, but not vegan, on account of the eggs and yogurt; I have not tested this with dairy-free yogurt nor a functional egg substitute. I have tested the cornstarch-and-water egg substitute and the cake doesn't work well, but no egg substitutes beyond that. If you test dairy-free yogurt or find an egg substitute that works, give me a comment to let me know how it fares.

This cake works quite nicely as a sheet birthday cake (#birthdaycake), without the need to ice, as the fruit topping adds that extra delight that icing typically does. Tested at a 9 year old's birthday party to the happy smiles of all and the delight of parents that it only contains 1/2 cup of added sugar for the whole cake.

INGREDIENTS and MATERIALS

Wets

• 1 lemon [substitute 1 orange]
• 2 eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 cup unflavored yogurt

Dries

• 1/2 cup sugar [substitute 1/3 cup maple syrup, and add it to wets]
• 6.6 ounces all purpose flour (aka 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour)
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt

Toppings

• non-citrus fruit you need to use up

Materials

• 2 mixing bowls
• food scale for measuring flour [skip if measuring flour by volume]
• blender or food processor [if you don't have either, follow this recipe, instead]
• danish dough whisk [substitute other mixing implements]
• silicone spatula for scraping batter from bowl and lemon puree from blender if desired
• a cake pan, any shape any size any type
• oven
• cake tester, toothpick, or fork to test cake's doneness (I personally use the shaft of a meat thermometer because I am all about that capsule kitchen .)

PREPWORK

1. Chop the fruit into a large dice to sprinkle on top of the cake.
2. Using a food processor or blender (Vitamix will blend this!), turn the lemon (1) into a puree of pulp, juice and other bits. Yes, the whole lemon. Yes, with the skin on. Yes, you just toss it in there. In my experience it helps the blender if you cut it into chunks first, but otherwise yes, including the seeds. If you don't have a blender or food processor, then follow this recipe to make the same cake.
3. Turn the oven on to 375F to preheat. Use this temperature for a conventional oven as well as a convection oven; adjustments will be made to cooking time for oven type.

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Look at your mixing bowls. Figure out which is the largest. Set that aside for your wets. Your next largest mixing bowl is for your dries.
2. Locate the dries's bowl and put it on top of your food scale. Tare the scale. Then, measure out your all purpose flour (6.6 ounces).
3. Add the remainder of the dries ( sugar 1/2 cup, baking soda 1 teaspoon, kosher salt 1/4 teaspoon) into the dries's bowl and give them a stir with the danish dough whisk to combine them.
4. In a separate mixing bowl, the largest one you've got, add your eggs (2) and give them a light scramble using the danish dough whisk.
5. Now, in the wets bowl, continue to add the remainder of your wets ( yogurt 1 cup, vanilla extract 2 teaspoons, lemon 1 pureed), stirring once more with the danish dough whisk at the end to ensure consistency.
6. In small batches, pour some of the dries mixture into the wet's bowl and blend with the danish dough whisk. No need to over-mix so long as it is all a single consistency. In fact, mixing less leads to a more moist and fluffy cake. I tend to blend in 3 batches. And you really do want to keep the wets and the dries separate until the final step before panning and baking because the baking soda will start its chemistry as soon as it meets the acid of the lemon juice from the wets, and you want it to do its chemistry in the oven, and not in your mixing bowl while you are still fussing about with ingredients.
7. Once the batter has been combined, add it to the cake pan. Assist the batter to reach the edges of the pan and give it a few firm taps on your countertop or table to level the batter. 
8. Now we're going to top our cake! Sprinkle the fruit (large dice) evenly over the surface of your cake.
9. Place the batter-filled cake pan in your oven (preheated to 375F) for the time that best matches the type of oven you have. Old-school conventional oven? 55 minutes. Convection oven or air fryer? 40 minutes.
10. At the end of the bake time, test the cake for doneness by putting a cake tester, toothpick, or tines of a fork into the center of the cake and seeing if they come out clean. Some small amount of cake crumbs may collect by the very tip of your cake testing implement and that is okay, you just don't want the whole thing streaked with raw batter.
11. Remove from the oven and allow to cool before serving.

NOTES

Cake may be frozen for later consumption. If freezing, I recommend portioning it ahead of time and tightly wrapping it in cling-film or freezer paper to prevent freezer burn. Thaw on the counter, or in the microwave for 15 second intervals.

I will also add that pureeing any lemons you have which are not going to go bad in the near future and freeing that puree, or pureeing any "spent" lemon wedges from your summer infused water and then freezing that puree, will allow you to have a good freezer stock of lemon puree that can substitute in any recipe which calls for BOTH lemon zest and lemon juice. Work efficiently not grating lemon zesty. The added fiber from the pith of the lemon will promote good gut health and won't alter the recipe's flavor.

Bibliography time! This recipe was adapted for the efficient cook who doesn't want to dip a measuring cup into a bag of flour nor zest a lemon from a great website called Yummy Toddler Food . Using sugar instead of maple syrup and using only baking soda instead of a combination of baking powder and baking soda was a brainstorm of yours truly as I stared at my pantry shelves and realized I just don't tend to stock those two ingredients. I did the math for the conversions, myself.