No Sour Lemons Around Here!

a happy good morning on a sweet sunshiny monday to you!

are you in the mood for some more cookin'?

you will love this cake if you are.

a couple of weeks ago a friend gave me a plastic shopping bag

full of lemons.

i know i could have made lemon butter/curd or probably

a billion other things...

but most of them were too laborious...like lemon meringue pie...3 processes..hehe!

i wanted something quick and very lemony.

i found this 'lemon madeira cake' recipe

in a little fat book called '500 cakes'...a title that just calls it what it is,

by susanna blake...of whom i have never heard of before...have you?

on first taste it was voted unanimously

'a family favourite'.

lemon madeira cake

220g or 8oz butter at room temperature

140g or 5oz castor sugar, plus 1-2 tablespoons full for sprinkling

3 large eggs

170g or 6oz self raising flour

30g or 1 oz plain flour

1 lemon...zest & juice

beat together the butter and sugar until pale and creamy. unfortunately i thought i was using raw castor sugar in this one and it was really ordinary raw sugar and i had to beat it extra hard to dissolve all those big crystals of sugar.

beat the eggs in one at a time.

sift the flours into the bowl and fold in.

add the lemon zest and juice and mix well.

spoon the batter into a large loaf tin that has been lined with silicone paper...i just tore a large square off and lined a glass loaf  dish..the beauty of this is that you don't have to grease the dish if it is fully papered and when cooked you just lift the whole loaf out, no worries.

sprinkle the top of the batter with sugar...

this makes a lovely crisp crunchy crust on top..mmm!

{saves icing it too}

bake for 55mins on 'fan' at 160 degrees celsius.

leave cake in tin for about 10 mins before lifting out...

then eat as soon as possible!

i made this one yesterday,

it's the perfect sunday afternoon tea cake.

my brother & partner came over for afternoon tea on their way home from brisbane.

they witnessed an accident on the highway about quarter of an hour from here,

so it was comfort food at its finest...with a nice cuppa tea..or diet coke.

{by the way..the young man in the accident had run off the road into a tree and broke his ankle but there were plenty of police, fireys and ambos to help him by the time they left the scene.}

this is about the fourth time in a month

that i have made this cake, we enjoy it so much..and so do our visitors.

do you use cake forks?

we didn't until about eight years ago when i found some beauties for half price at david jones'...

now even the men around the house use them!

i love mondays...

they are my only truly relaxing day, nothing planned at all.

i hope your day is stress free too...

naturally Carol xox