lemon drzzl (baking post no. 1)

from time to time something odd tickles my fancy & i decide to watch a program on bbc iplayer. as a general rule, i don't watch television - have never had much interest for it, and even less time - but sometimes i have the urge to 'get with society' and come out from under my rock so i turn on bbc iplayer with this incredible urge of finally understanding who doctor who is or why everyone at work is always talking about top gun or top gear or whatever it is. but then i see a video of sir david attenborough and i can't help but click. like dr strangelove's arm, my cursor involuntarily makes its way to the videos of lemurs or sharks or giant eggs. (i want david attenborough to read me bedtime stories. no, seriously. he is that golden).

this time, something else caught my eye. i had, by this point, either forgotten and given up my endeavor to be socially 'with it'. there was a picture of a grinning raymond blanc with a loaf in his hand. a famous name in these parts, his was sharing his kitchen secrets. & so i clicked : BBC iPlayer - Raymond Blanc's Kitchen Secrets: Series 2: Cakes and Pastries

i have never seen a man so excited about his own baking. i was so fueled by his enthusiasm, that by the end of the episode i felt like a pastry sous-chef, ready to go, whisk in hand. monsieur blanc, here i come!

the first thing he made was a lemon drizzle cake. my boyfriend loves lemon drizzle, so i decided this was going to be my weekend project. (also, all the other things he made looked really difficult. lemon difficult.) i went to the store, bought some lemons &tc, and away i went.

i squeezed & peeled & mixed & sifted & cooled & glazed. ( i may add i sifter through a tea strainer. i couldn't find a proper sifter. after i did about half the flour in tablespoon amounts, i switched to a colander. of course i found a sifter once the cake was done) and came up with this:



this is what raymond blanc's lemon drizzle looked like:




now, how come raymond was able to make a lovely, loaf shaped cake with a smooth, clear icing, while mine was topped with some sort of strange, bulbous growth, covered icing that looks like something died & melted over the loaf, and was probably the ugliest baking project i could have imagined. that is not what i pictured in my head.

while the cake was in the oven i went through a clean ALL the things mode, daydreaming about my loaf. it was supposed to look like this:


it was supposed to be lovelier than raymond blanc's! it was supposed to be the loaf of all loaves! beautiful & perfect! it was supposed to be shiny & smooth & perfect.

but i had to make do with what i baked, & so i presented my monster loaf to my boyfriend, who greeted it with utmost enthusiasm, which made me happy. & guess what?

IT WAS DELICIOUS!

it was more delicious than the one in the picture. and the lemon drizzle was perfectly zesty. and the cake soft & moist. it was the most delicious lemon loaf ever! HURRAH!

with my baking skills confirmed, i will now work my way through raymond blanc's list of patisseries. next on my list is his chocolate eclairs. but first, i believe i owe someone a banoffee pie...