ORANGE ALMOND SYRUP PUDDINGS

It's Winter.  Oranges abound.  Let's use up the glut deliciously.
Plus, I have a very special friend visiting this afternoon.  She and I have always bonded over variations of the truth while smoking ourselves into a Foggy Haze.  We grew up and stopped smoking.  So what do ex-smokers do when they get together?  They EAT.  But the eating has to be very, very good:

I'm gonna try these little numbers for size:  They stem from Persia, but are also used as a Jewish Passover desert, and I'll add that they're Gluten Free.  But aside from all that, they have been calling me to cook them for a week now....

Orange Almond Syrup Puddings:

A quick video - instead of single puddings, a whole cake

I followed the Coles recipe... and may very well cook every single thing in this months book

Moist - emphasis on moist - Orange Poppy Seed Cake

I still haven't got around to explaining the purpose of this blog.... bear with me. Perhaps if you read and see my madcap way of cooking, it'll dawn on you.  Nobody has to be a good cook in order to cook

I love this cake, but although it takes minutes to slap together, the "boiling oranges" bit can take a fair whack of time (and the 'boiled orange' is where we get the moistness of this cake - you can choose not to, but you'll just have an orange poppy seed cake then, not a moist orange poppy seed cake).  

But I just found out I can microwave the oranges!!!  Never one to shirk a good nuclear blast, I currently have my oranges in the microwave for 8 minutes (that's a long time to be nuked).  

HOW TO MAKE THE CAKE 

I turned the oven on.  You know - the usual moderate oven thingy

170deg C/350F.    

I also readied my cake tin.  I have recently upgraded from my tiny little, rusty-round-the-edges cake tin, to a high-top spring form pan.  THIS IN ITSELF TRANSFORMS YOU INTO A COOK WHO KNOWS WHAT THEY'RE DOING.  The cake tin needs to be oiled/buttered OR... my personal favourite: spray the crap out of it with cooking oil spray - IT DOESN'T MATTER which oil.  It's just to stop it sticking.  You can, if you want (and it always looks good) cut out a circle of baking paper the same size as the bottom of your cake tin.  Put it in the tin - no point cutting it out and putting it anywhere else.  It too will aid in the smooth transition from tin to cake cooling rack after it's holiday in the tropics of the oven. 

Don't worry yourself over your cutting out abilities.  I have never had a cake complain.

The actual cake recipe:

2 oranges – boiled twice with fresh water for 15 minutes OR microwave as below.  Then roughly chopped, skin & all (boiling it twice with fresh water takes the acid taste away - which will be interesting to see if the microwave version can eliminate that taste..)  185g butter, melted or 1 cup of vegetable oil  3 eggs  1 cup castor sugar  1 ½ cups self-raising flour - it doesn't matter if it's Gluten Free or 'normal'  2 Tablespoons poppy seeds