Malted Chocolate Layer Cake

Moist chocolate cake layered with rich malted chocolate buttercream

One of the questions I’m most often asked about this blog is where I get my love of food and baking from. My first point of reference is almost always my parents – a childhood where helping my Mum out in the kitchen and making my own birthday cakes was the norm, every summer spent in Italy amongst an abundance of incredible produce and a father whose eyes are a whole lot smaller than the stomach which unfortunately reflects his infectious love of food (sorry Dad!).

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Chocolate, Caramel & Peanut ‘Snickers’ Layer Cake

Dark chocolate & peanut sponges layered with caramel

Back in 2006, Anthony Worrall Thompson‘s ‘Snickers Pie‘ was labelled ‘one of the unhealthiest recipes ever published’ by the Food Commission. At a whopping 1,250 calories per serving and with no less than five super sweet chocolate bars chopped into it, this puff pastry crusted creation was cited as an example of chefs’ irresponsibility with regards to calorie control and our increasingly unhealthy attitude to what constitutes home baking.

Fellow food blogger Jamie Schler recently wrote this interesting piece for the Huffington Post bemoaning the wave of boxed brownie mix, chopped up chocolate bars and cans of frosting masquerading on blogs around the world as home baked treats. While I’m not averse to the odd Oreo crumbled into a blondie or topping a cupcake with fizzy cola bottles, I absolutely agree with her that baking should be about creating things from scratch. It may not make them calorie-free, but using real butter, free range eggs, seasonal fresh fruit and natural colourings in all my recipes is important to me and feels a world away from the oleaginous Worrall-Thompson’s sickly sweet idea of dessert.

Honey Chocolate Cake

Honey chocolate cake decorated with little chocolate bees

The only reason for being a bee that I know of is to make honey . . . And the only reason for making honey is so as I can eat it’  Winnie the Pooh

When I was a little girl, my parents were fairly sensible when it came to the consumption of anything sweet. My Mum’s a wonderful cook, and we were allowed to eat the odd pudding on special occasions, but day-to-day meals were more likely to end in a handful of grapes or a little pot of yoghurt than anything more exotic and sugar-laden. I’m not saying we were deprived – we ate the most incredible home-cooked meals – but let’s just say mine was the only mother I’ve ever known to put packets of Sunmaid raisins in the goody bags of trick-or-treaters come Halloween.

Honey Chocolate Cake

Honey chocolate cake decorated with little chocolate bees

The only reason for being a bee that I know of is to make honey . . . And the only reason for making honey is so as I can eat it’  Winnie the Pooh

When I was a little girl, my parents were fairly sensible when it came to the consumption of anything sweet. My Mum’s a wonderful cook, and we were allowed to eat the odd pudding on special occasions, but day-to-day meals were more likely to end in a handful of grapes or a little pot of yoghurt than anything more exotic and sugar-laden. I’m not saying we were deprived – we ate the most incredible home-cooked meals – but let’s just say mine was the only mother I’ve ever known to put packets of Sunmaid raisins in the goody bags of trick-or-treaters come Halloween.

Honey Chocolate Cake

Honey chocolate cake decorated with little chocolate bees

The only reason for being a bee that I know of is to make honey . . . And the only reason for making honey is so as I can eat it’  Winnie the Pooh

When I was a little girl, my parents were fairly sensible when it came to the consumption of anything sweet. My Mum’s a wonderful cook, and we were allowed to eat the odd pudding on special occasions, but day-to-day meals were more likely to end in a handful of grapes or a little pot of yoghurt than anything more exotic and sugar-laden. I’m not saying we were deprived – we ate the most incredible home-cooked meals – but let’s just say mine was the only mother I’ve ever known to put packets of Sunmaid raisins in the goody bags of trick-or-treaters come Halloween.

Simple chocolate birthday cake with white chocolate frosting

Simple chocolate cake with white chocolate frosting and stars

When it comes to birthdays, chocolate has always been my cake of choice. My Mum loved spending time in the kitchen with me and my brother as kids, and always encouraged us to choose and make our own cakes. While a simple sponge topped with a mixture of Greek yoghurt and melted chocolate was her standard offering, over the years I can variously remember: a chocolate elephant iced in pink fondant and studded with silver balls; a giant ‘K’ initial decorated with orange and lemon jelly slices; a chocolate biscuit rabbit on a bed of grass-green jelly (this bizarre favourite from the fabulous spiral-bound Keep Out of the Kitchen Mum became a birthday staple for several years in a row and still holds  special place in my heart); a giant horse’s head complete with ‘writing icing’ bridle (when I was going through the inevitable pony phase); a classic chocolate fudge cake covered in edible leaves. I could go on . . .