my favourite lemon loaf

There were a few sad looking lemons in the house so I decided to make my favourite lemon loaf. I originally got this recipe from a magazine (can't remember which one) where it was listed as a lemon blueberry loaf. I left out the blueberries one time and have been making it that way ever since. This time I added 1 tablespoon of poppy seeds, just for kicks. When I haven't had any lemons around, I've successfully made it with oranges.

The French refer to anything in the form of a loaf (savory or sweet) as a "cake" (pronounced "kék") so this is my "cake au citron."

lemon loaf
1/3 cup butter
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
grated lemon rind of 1 lemon
1 Tbsp poppy seeds (optional)

for the glaze
juice of one lemon (or maybe two)
1/3 cup sugar

directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (180 degrees C). Grease and flour a loaf pan (mine is 4.5 x 12 inches).

In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar. Add the eggs, one at a time.

In a small bowl, mix flour, baking powder, salt and lemon rind.

Add the dry ingredients and milk to the butter/sugar/egg mix, alternating between dry and milk, ending with dry. Pour into the loaf pan and bake for 30-40 minutes, or until the top is golden and a knife inserted into the middle comes out clean. (The original recipe gave a cooking time of 55-60 minutes. My oven doesn't indicate temperature, it just gives the numbers from 1-9, so maybe it runs hotter than I'm assuming. At any rate, my loaf was done - and maybe a little overdone - after 40 minutes.)

Once the loaf comes out of the oven, heat the sugar and lemon juice for the glaze in a pan. Once the sugar has dissolved and the mixture is bubbly, pierce the loaf with a toothpick or knife all over and pour the glaze over the whole loaf. Let sit for a while before inverting onto a plate.