This is one of THOSE cakes. The memorable ones. The ones you will be making again and again. You will take it to a friends house as a gift, bake it when your in-laws come for tea, or lock the door and keep it all to your self with a large jug of coffee. Its tender, aromatic, flavourful and as fresh as a summer’s breeze.

I rarely use self raising flour for baking but in this case, self raising flour will give you the best results and a perfectly tender cake.

There is something about lemony cakes that makes them highly addictive and amazingly delicious. The lemon juice makes this cake less sweet but with such amazing flavour and aroma. Plus the syrup keeps it moist and soft. As I said, this is one of THOSE cakes. It definitely belongs to my tea-cake hall of fame.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups self-raising flour
• ½ tsp salt,
• 250 gr unsalted butter (softened)
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 Tbs lemon zest
• ½ cup milk
• ¾ cup chopped pistachios

For the syrup

• 1/3 cup sugar
• 1 Tbs orange blossom water
• ¼ cup lemon juice

Method:

Preheat oven 175 C. Butter and flour a 23 cm bundt pan

Make the syrup. Mix sugar and lemon juice together in a small saucepan. Bring to boil and immediately take off the heat. Add the orange blossom water. Leave to cool.

Make the cake batter. In a bowl, sift together flour, and salt. In a bowl of a stand mixer, fitted with the paddle attachment, beat butter and sugar on medium-high speed until fluffy. Add eggs one at a time beating well (at least 30 seconds) after each addition. Add zest and vanilla.

Turn speed to low and add 3 tablespoons of flour mixture and the milk. Add the remaining flour and beat briefly until mixed. Don’t over beat. Add the pistachios and mix again until incorporated.

Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake for 45-50 minutes, until a cake tester comes out clean. As soon as cake comes out of the oven brush its surface with a little cooled syrup. Leave in the pan for half an hour. Turn cake over on a serving platter. Brush all over with the remaining syrup. Sprinkle chopped pistachios if you wish.

Cool cake completely before slicing and serving.