thursday baking - lemon, lime and poppyseed syrup cake

I love the Meyer lemons that are around at the moment - lovely and juicy with bright yellow zest - the perfect lemon for baking with. They were on special at the supermaket last week so I bought a bowlful (I don't have my own lemon tree, sadly) and made these loaves. The recipe says to use a ring tin but I made these cute wee loaves. I had intentions of freezing some but they were so yummy they all got eaten before they made it to the freezer.

The addition of lime made these little loaves especially tangy - I'm going to try using a mix of lemon and lime next time I make my favourite lemon yoghurt cake (Alison Holst's recipe) as although delicious, this recipe didn't have the keeping qualities of the Alison Holst recipe. This surprised me as I expected drowning the little loaves in syrup would have kept them moist but instead they were showing their age after a couple of days.

Lemon, lime and poppyseed syrup cake - Catherine Bell -Week 27

Cake

125g butter, softened

2 tsp finely grated lime zest

2 tsp finely grated lemon zest

250g castor sugar

3 eggs

200g flour

2 tsp baking powder

2 tbsp poppy seeds

100ml natural yoghurt

Syrup

3 tbsp lime juice

3 tbsp lemon juice

3 tbsp castor sugar

Preheat oven to 180c. Place butter, lime and lemon zest in bowl of cake mixer and blend well until light and creamy. Add sugar gradually, beating well after every addition. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each. Combine the flour, bp and seeds and fold into the butter, alternating with the yoghurt. Spoon into a greased and lined 4-cup capacity ring (or bundt) tin. Bake 30-35 mins or until a skewer comes out clean. Allow cake to stand in tin for 5 mins, then turn onto a rack.

To make the syrup combine all ingredients in a small pan, simmer, stirring constantly until sugar is dissolved, then boil for 3 minutes without stirring. Poke holes all over cake with a skewer or fork, and pour syrup over the hot cake. Serve warm or cold with dollops of yoghurt.

A few of our favourite things...

Miriam: A couple of years ago, Becs gave me this lemon/lime squeezer as a birthday present. You place half the citrus, cut side down in the squeezer, then squeeze. The citrus is turned inside out, thus extracting every last bit of juice. There are wee slits in the bottom that don't allow any pips to creep through - genius!

Libby: Free rosemary! There's no need to grow your own rosemary in Wellington as it grows like a weed all over the place. It's particularly abundant just down the hill in Thorndon where I know of several spots I can pick a sprig or two from when I need it. This sprig was finely chopped along with a clove of garlic and lemon zest and sprinkled over a wintery beef and vegetable casserole. Yum!

Becs: At home we have a 'chocolate drawer' that is always full of packaged sweet treats, as well as chocolate for baking. You would think this drawer would be a constant temptation, however for some reason most of the time this doesn't seem to be the case, and often things remain in it for months or even years. However one recent addition to the chocolate drawer that I find impossible to resist is Whittakers Ghana Peppermint. I have always loved Whittaker's plain Ghana block for baking with, but this deliciously dark chocolate with the addition of a flowing peppermint centre it is seriously good. It is impossible to stop at one piece...