I made one of my favorites, a cornmeal cake from an Epicurious recipe, to take to a friend's on Sunday night. But instead of the rosemary syrup, which is really good, I used some peaches and apricots on my counter to make what ended up being kind of a homemade "peaches canned in light syrup." (Forgive the quote marks.) This grainy cake is a wonderful sponge that soaked up all that peachy syrup.

I started with a simple syrup: 1 cup water and 1 cup sugar boiled and stirred until the sugar dissolved. Then I added peeled, diced peaches, which hadn't gotten very ripe, and tried to cook them into submission for a few minutes. Then I added the apricots, which had ripened, and set the whole mixture in my fridge overnight.

The next day I made the cake: 1/2 cup butter and 1 cup sugar beaten until fluffy (although it just got kind of fluffy-clumpy). Add 1 cup cornmeal, 3/4 cup flour, 2/3 cup milk, 1 teaspoon baking powder, 2 eggs, 1 egg yolk, 3/4 teaspoon salt, and mix it all together. Bake in a 8-inch pan in a 350 degree oven for 40 minutes (mine took 50). Let it cool a bit, then brush on about 1/3 cup of the peach syrup. Serve the rest, including the fruit, with the cake at the table.