carry a torch

hello, i just had a very successful baking experience! today's project was the madeira cake, recipe by nigella lawson('s mother-in-law?). once again, nigella has promised and delivered! so here are the pics:
simple ingredients, simple cake.
this is my first time grating a lemon. and squeezing the juice from the lemon was quite hard, because i've never done it before too haha.
hello hello dear loaf tin, thanks to nigella, you'll be used for the cake. otherwise you'll never get to come out of the cupboard. anyway, this was slightly bigger than the tin specified in the recipe. still, it gave a nice cake, alhough i think the correct-sized one would yield a prettier cake.
the final batter!
and into the oven it goes. the recipe said to sprinkle sugar on top, which i did, and i watched as the sugar melted and recrystallised in the baking process.
this is ten minutes into baking.
this is twenty minutes into baking.
this is thirty minutes into baking. by now the heavenly smell of the cake is coming out. and the top crust begins to crack. (it says in the recipe that the cake should have a long crack down the middle, but i think that happens only with the right loaf tin. for mine, i just got a flat-topped cake instead of a doming one, so there wasn't a substantial crack.)
and i gave the cake a turn so that the heating was more even. over here you can see the cracks forming.
this is forty minutes into baking.
this is fifty minutes into baking. by now the rising stops, and we're just waiting for nicer cracking. and still the smell was heavenly.
one hour of baking!
and it comes out of the oven. just in time too, because the top is about to get burnt!
oh yes i achieved the dull brown of the crust as shown in my recipe book. but my inside was not as yellow as nigella's. still, the cake was perfectly baked, and the crust was very nice.

ok time for some 东方神起!


these two songs are so nice, and they give me goosebumps (not in the bad way).