orange & poppyseed syrup cake

When left to my own devices, I find that I'll always end up in the kitchen at some point. Whether it's to grab a snack, to grab a drink of water, to read the paper or to idle my afternoon away, the kitchen has a lot to offer. More often than not, you'll find me pick up a recipe book whilst in the kitchen and withing seconds later, I'll be rummaging around looking for all the ingredients that I need. That's what I did this afternoon when it was hot outside and a certain sense of lethargy required some baking to keep my mind and hands occupied.

The recipe I used today was from Cafe Cakes (part of the Australian Women's Weekly mini series). At last count, between mum and I, we're pretty close to collecting the whole set. Strangely enough, amongst all the other recipe books which have earned their spot on my bookshelf, the AWW cookbooks have ended up being the most used. I attribute it to the simplicity of the recipes and the fact that you know there's always a recipe in there where you have all the ingredients on hand to start baking. I highly recommend Cafe Cakes for their Friand as well as Orange & Poppyseed Cake recipes. Yum!

Cake, straight out of the oven.

Sliced and ready to be consumed. By the way, Happy Birthday Billy!

There's so much baking/cooking that I want to do that I'm not even sure how I'll fit it in! Thanks to work, this week I inherited some back issues of Australian Gourmet Traveller, Dish & Australian Table which provided good entertainment this afternoon whilst the cake was in the oven. I need to have a party and I need to have people who can eat lots and lots!