There is no particular knack to making a good fruit cake - indeed any cake at all. If you have a good recipe and measure everything out well, have an eye for what's 'right' and what's not - you can't go far wrong. That's my take on the subject anyway, and I'm often asked by friends what the secret is to a good cake. Is it the ingredients? Or how one treats the mixture, or does the perfect cake need a particular type of oven. Well, I always reply, it's a bit of everything. You do need to treat the mixture with love (particularly if you're having problems with a Victoria sponge), firm but tender works well (for most things, I may add). You also need good ingredients, a cake can only be as good as what one puts into it. And as for ovens, it seems to make not one jot of difference what type - gas or fan, as long as it's hot. But the best baking can only come when you put your heart and soul into it.



Unlike some people, I absolutely love baking and cooking. Food is something I'm passionate about and so it's seldom a chore - and baking never so. From the quickest Victoria sponge to the most-involved bread or pastry it's the time and care taken that are the most important bits. I don't know where my love of all-things-food came from, but it's a long-kindled passion with smells, tastes and textures that seems to be inexplicably ingrained into my personality. Baking is food and food is home. Simple. So if you're looking for the perfect way to make the perfect cake look no further - it's all about the care and attention lavished upon the ingredients that makes the perfect cake. My grandmother would say "If a job is worth doing, it's worth doing well.".

Now off for a cup of tea before bed, with a slice of the still-warm cake above, so that I may slip peacefully off into the land of Nod, before my rude awakening to start work tomorrow.