This cake has been baked for birthdays and special occasions in my family for literal decades. It became so famous in our friendship circles that even friends of friends started asking my mother to make it.

It’s my standard birthday request from Mum these days, I don’t ask for anything else.

It’s literally just a plain poppy seed cake

I grabbed her hand-typed (yes, typed – on a typewriter) cookbook notes and snatched this page out. As you can see, it’s a well-worn recipe.

And now I share it with the world at large.

My only advice is to not overbake it and once cooked, if you can wait, seal it up in an airtight container when it’s cool enough and let it sit overnight. Something magical happens to it where it loses its crumbliness, it becomes a little denser and the flavours develop.

It’s a bare-bones cake. It doesn’t need icing/frosting or extra flavouring, though obviously orange essence or orange rind can be thrown in for the classic orange poppy seed kick, or you can just dust the cake with icing sugar or even do a lemon drizzle.

It can be made in loaf form, round cake form or even a ring/bundt cake.

Also, for non-old-school baking people, “moderate oven” = 180°C / 360°F

And yes, you get a bonus caraway seed cake recipe as shown in the picture. That’s a very old-fashioned flavour.