Recovery week

So this is me this week!As a matter of fact, in my Quo Vadis I wrote:POSITIVE THOUGHTSGOLDEN LIGHTDO NOTHINGRESTAnd I wrote it across all the pages of the week.I wrote that because last Friday I had some facial reconstruction surgery to repair some of the radiation damage.Yup, it was unpleasant. Yup, it hurts. Yes it was a risk with the real possibility of dying tissue, but everything seems to have gone well and I'm Okay. <3Today my little note to myself says: "What would someone who loves themselves do?"Rest. Rest and more rest.But today I also had to visit my plastic surgeon, so while I was up and about, I decided to bake myself a little treat.Last week when I drove through Keremeos and stopped at the fruit and veggie stand, I bought a little pundit of apricots. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but I should have known better because apricots so out of season very rarely taste very yummy. Actually, that's my usual rule for all fruit and veg so no, I don't know what I was thinking. Anyway, here I had these not so nice apricots at home.My grandmother used to make a lovely fruity type coffee cake called a bublanina. Roughly translates to bubble cake. She made it every week and used all sorts of fruit in it. I decided to bake myself a bublanina as a treat (because right now I'm a poor baby so deserve fattening sugary treats...lol)I took out my grandmother's cookbook and found the bublanina recipe.Yes, a very well used page!I wish you guys could read Czech recipes. The language is so friendly. It's as though the directions include you instead of being directed at you. For example, a line of this recipe reads: "Our mixed sugar, eggs, lemon and vanilla, we cream them together for 30 minutes." This is how we do it. Oh yes, by hand...with a wooden spoon! Actually, truth be told, in the Kitchen Aid.So I mixed up a little buttery, sugary dough, topped it with those apricots and a little sprinkling of blueberries, and popped it into the oven for 35 minutes.That's incidentally the time it took for the lawn service to finish making a racket at my neighbour's next door.Then I had a lovely, warm slice of my bublanina, and now it's back to bed with me.Bubble cake adapted from my grandmother's recipe to bring it out of the middle ages.1/2 cup organic cane sugar1/4 cup softened butter2 large eggs1 cup plain flour1 tsp baking powder1 cup yogourt1 tbsp Grand Marnier (because, why not?)1/2 tsp vanilla extractthe tip of a knife worth of salt (seriously, that’s what it says)what have you of fruit. I used a dozen apricots and a handful of blueberries. My grandmother’s best bublanina was always with cherries.Pre-heat the oven to 350°F.- Mix the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.- Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing well in between, add the Grand Marnier and vanilla.- Sift in the flour and baking powder, and the salt, then mix well.- Finally, add the yogourt to create a thick dough to support the fruit on top.- Pour the batter into a greased and lined baking tin of some kind. I used 9-inch springform tart tin.- Prepare the fruit: slice the apricots, stone the cherries, halve the strawberries, etc.- Scatter the fruit into the top of the batter and press lightly.- Bake for 35-40 minutes, grandmother’s book reads “until rosy”.