Lemon Poppy Seed Bread

After a some tinkering and working from 3 or 4 other recipes, I am pretty happy with how this came out. I've been using some Meyer lemons folks at school brought in, but I think it'd only be better with sourer lemons.

Makes:
one big loaf - or - 12 little muffins and a little loaf - or - 12 pretty big muffins - or - four little loaves

What's in it:
2 1/2 c white all purpose flour
2 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
2/3 c granulated sugar
1/2 c canola oil
2 eggs
1/2 c lemon juice (~3 small lemons or 2 big ones)
1/2 c milk
Rind of as many lemons as you juiced, coarsely grated or chopped
1/2 c chopped pecans
3 T poppy seeds

What to do:
Mix all dry ingredients together. I like to use a whisk for this.

Mix your sugar with your oil (or other fat). Add lemon rind, eggs, lemon juice, milk. (If you are lazy as I often am, you can add these straight into the dry ingredients, rather than getting another bowl dirty. Mixing the lemon into the sugar first will better infuse the flavor, though.)

Add wet ingredients into flour mixture and stir in pecans and poppy seeds.

Grease and flour bread / cupcake tins. (Skip the flouring if you want, but it does make getting your breads back out of the tin ever so easy.)

Bake at 350º for about 45 minutes - more for a big loaf, less for cupcakes.

Et voila!

Options:
Feel free to skip the nuts if you're not into that, or if you don't have any handy.
Skip the poppy seeds if you must, but they really take this bread from a ten up to eleven.
If you are in a curious state of mind (or lacking some supplies in the cupboard), try some of these substitutions:
*for canola oil: vegetable, nut (such as pecan or walnut) oil. You could also try olive oil, if you want, or soft butter.
*for white sugar: brown sugar. You could also try agave or maple syrup.
*for pecans: walnuts or any other nut.
You can skip the milk all together, if you like.

Notes:
The big chunks of lemon rind make these especially fun.
These muffins taste especially scrumptious toasted in the buff - without a muffin tin sheathing them from the oven heat - but then what bread doesn't taste better toasted?