Burnin' Up the Kitchen

I got this recipe from a friend years ago, which had been her family for years as well. It has been the best party, sunday morning, whatever easy recipe. I have only messed it up once because I was a dork and forgot baking powder.
All notes below are from three different people, please feel free to add your own. My favorite way to make it is with orange peel and dark chocolate chunks.

tea cake from rebekah:
The basic Tea Cake recipe - my notes are in parentheses.
2 c flour
3/4 c sugar
1/2 t salt
1 1/2 t baking powder
1/2 c butter (my mother and grandmother used shortening -
ick)
1 1/2 t vanilla (I always use a little bit more)
1 - 1 1/2 c raisins
milk to texture
Mix together all dry ingredients thoroughly and then cut
butter into mixture
with pastry cutter until mixture is fine and butter is
completely fine and
blended (Frankly, I have better results when I heat butter
in the microwave
and blend gradually, but the traditional recipe calls for
cutting it). Add
raisins, vanilla and a small amount of milk and stir. The
overall texture
should be 'batter-like', so watch carefully not to add too
much milk.
I also add various things to change the recipe. Favorites
include rose or
orange water, orange peel, cardamom (the one at Finn's
Birthday/Father's Day
was cardamom, cinnamon flavored) cinnamon, nutmeg, etc.
etc. - I don't
really like it with nuts, but I've had it with crushed
almonds and chocolate
chips and that was really good too.
Butter small baking dish (the above 100% recipe fits great
in an 8" x 8" pan
- for Finn's birthday I did a 150% recipe in a 13" x 8")
and spoon in
batter. Bake at 325 for 35 minutes or until golden brown
top. The above
recipe feeds 9-10 1 piece, and since it's semi-dessert like
maybe that's
enough.