Darling Delia

Sunday Afternoon Tease

You may remember me telling you that I won a competition with Jubilee Strawberries, with my Pimms O'clock Cake.  Well, my prize was a copy of Delia's Cakes, which I received last week.

I love this book and it reminds me of the first cookery book that I bought for myself when I was in my early twenties; Delia's Complete Cookery Course.  This was the book that I used to teach myself to cook and I used it for many years.

My mum was a great home baker, although she never taught me to cook.  This was mostly because I showed no interest or aptitude for cooking, although she possibly lacked the patience to teach me anyway.  She did give me one excellent piece of advice though, which was;

  If you can read, you can cook.

All my early baking attempts were guided by this book, and they were largely a success.  Butterfly cakes, Victoria sponge cakes, ginger biscuits, chocolate brownies, Queen of Puddings and shortbread to name but a few.  In my mid twenties, at home with small children, I slowly gained confidence with my baking.  I took my mum's advice and followed the recipes carefully; there is after all a certain alchemy to baking.

I don't look at my battered copy of this first Delia book any more, and have long since been seduced by the gorgeous Nigella and other baking goddesses.  This new copy of Delia's Cakes has revived my love for her recipes and there are some crackers in here.

The first recipe I have tried is the Double Lemon Drizzle Cake with Poppy Seeds.  This is a stunning lemon cake that oozes with lemony loveliness.  It uses three large lemons which gives it a kind of citrus KAPOW!!!

Luckily for those of you who don't have the book,  the recipe for this cake can be found here at deliaonline.com;  I would urge all you lemon cake fans to have a go at making this, because it is the yummiest lemon poppy cake I have ever eaten, by a mile.

Darling Delia, I can't wait to dive in to some more of your divine recipes, Mwah!

GALx