Recipe collections

Almond cake with fresh raspberries, flavoured with cinnamon and lemon zest. It’s flourless, dairy and gluten free, yet wonderfully airy and soft.

Angel food cake is light as air, fatless and egg yolk-less. Egg whites whipped to a cloud, with only a whisper of flour and no baking powder, it bakes in a special tin with a chimney, or an ungreased ring tin. Best decorated with cream and berries!

Cheat's apple strudel with apple chunks and raisins wrapped in sweet tea bread dough. This is a cheat’s recipe. There’s no stretching and stretching and stretching and reading love letters through the dough involved.

Buttery loaf cake with dried apricot chunks and generous crumble topping; it’s a winter version of the fruit crumble cake, and all the ingredients you should have in your pantry.

Apricot upside-down butter cake. Just when I thought I've seen it all when it comes to cake batters, here comes this little number and what a lovely one it is. The texture is gorgeous, it's not hard to make and it keeps if you let it.

White chocolate banana blondie with chunks of brazil nut toffee. Banana blondie recipe from Dan Lepard’s Short and Sweet recipe book.

Banana loaf cake with raisins. Not sure why some call it banana ‘bread’ – it’s cake all right, sweet and raisiny, and just to make double certain no one will cut a slice of it for a ham and cheese sarnie, I’ve glazed it with sticky honey and cream topping.

Banana and chocolate chip cake with olive oil, spices, molasses and dark brown sugar. Super easy recipe, no mixer needed for this banana chocolate chip cake.

Victorian Savoy cake, or biscuit de savoie, is the lightest butterless sponge cake. Fuller taste than angel food, more forgiving than genoise and far more sophisticated than Victoria sponge.

Caribbean Christmas black cake with rum soaked fruit and burnt sugar flavour. It is the Jamaican or Trinidad cousin of British Christmas cake and it stands tall in comparison!

Nigella’s black forest brownies, with sweet dried cherries soaked in kirsch or orange juice, is the brownie recipe you didn’t know you were missing.

Black forest gâteau, rich and dark chocolate base layered with pillows of cream swathing fresh, lightly roasted cherries. A luxurious idea for the next birthday or celebration bake.

Blood orange and olive oil cake with zest and chunks of orange in the mix. If you’d like to ice it, beat juice of half a blood orange into 80g icing sugar until smooth. Pour over the top of the cake and spread with a palette knife.

Blueberry and cream sponge cake is a magnificent dessert. Blueberry Victoria sponge, with layers of lightly roasted blueberries and whipped Chantilly cream is easy to make but very impressive to serve.

Blueberry, almond and lemon loaf cake by Ottolenghi with the sugar amount cut down a little by CuisineFiend. It’s still a masterpiece of a cake – all credit to Ottolenghi.

Blueberry buckle cake with wholemeal flour and quinoa and oats topping. That of course refers to the way the topping buckles on top of the fruit in a wavy manner. Very descriptive. I think I’ll adopt it now, especially that the blueberry kind is the most common buckle and that is my firm favourite.

Blueberry poppy seed cake, easier to make than a pie and delicious warm or cold. It is a pie of sorts or a tart, or flan, with the filling surrounded by a golden brown crust.

Blueberry upside down polenta cake. Polenta cake batter is so nice because of its crunch. And let's be honest: since anything with blueberries is gorgeous, so is this and I shouldn't have doubted it for a second.

Brazilian carrot cake, bolo de cenoura, is mixed in a blender and the outcome is as reassuringly pleasing as the English tearoom staple.

Spiced brown apple cake with cocoa, probably the easiest apple cake recipe of the 'mix and bake' kind. It's fragrant with cinnamon and cloves, dark brown with cocoa and dotted with pale chunks of apples.

The ultimate brownie - the best you've ever eaten, with milk and white chocolate chunks, just to be extra indulgent. I do understand chocoholics and this is specially for them. Good old fashioned brownie. Hits the right spot without fail.

Yule log, or buche de Noel made with chocolate sponge and chocolate whipped cream filling. This is DEFINITELY the best dessert on Christmas day. It rides onto the table when everyone is in deep gluttonous stupor after third helpings of turkey and just one more last spoonful of stuffing, and suddenly they perk up mumbling ‘this is a bit of all right’ and ‘I might have room for the thinnest slice more’.

Striped pattern berry cake with buckwheat and almond flour. This is lovely, the sooner served after leaving the oven, the better, as with time the berries start to leach juice a bit and the thing looks much messier.

Indulge in the rich and creamy flavours of my burnt Basque cheesecake recipe inspired by Nigella Lawson. It is sure to be a showstopper at your next gathering.

Burnt white chocolate blondie with cherries and pistachios, fudgy squares of bliss. I simply pity everyone who will never try one of these.

Cardamom cake with a crunchy almond bottom layer which turns into upside down topping, is a delicious, fragrant sponge lifted only with air beaten into the eggs and sugar mix.

Carrot and ginger cake, two of the best cake flavours together, with cream cheese frosting on top. Easy to make like all carrot cakes but the end result is stunning.

Carrot cake, simple and easy but unconventionally filled with apricot jam and decorated with chocolate ganache. Classic carrot cake with a zing!

Carrot, orange and pistachio cake layered with lemon cream cheese frosting. Dan Lepard's recipe for moist, spiced carrot cake with a couple of unusual ingredients.

Cherry and marzipan cake: a simple buttermilk cake batter with glace cherries and a layer of homemade marzipan. Result: stunning. Just try. And don’t you DARE use shop bought marzipan!

Cherry cream dacquoise is an exquisite gateau which is far easier to make than you’d think. Almond meringue dacquoise layers filled with fresh cream and homemade candied cherries – a riff on black forest gateau.

Chocolate and glace cherry cake; my deconstructed black forest gateau. Cherries mixed into the batter, cream served on the side, it’s a mere hint of the black forest cake.

The best chocolate cake with tart apricot jam filling and chocolate ganache layers. Rich and fudgy gateau, not very difficult to make. Your next birthday cake?

Chocolate genoise sponge cake with raspberry flavoured buttercream and whipped chocolate ganache frosting is the perfect birthday, holiday or any celebration cake.

Chocolate cake with passion fruit buttercream is more than just a cake; it's the perfect celebration gateau. For when you want to eat the cake, not just look at it.

Chocolate loaf cake with crunchy streusel; not too sweet, not too sickly, just right. With a large mug of milky coffee it will go down a treat even at half past seven in the morning.

Easy chocolate cake with yoghurt, honey and shaved chocolate. The batter is ready in about three minutes and the cake is almost healthy – not much fat and not much sugar.

Traditional Christmas fruitcake, my family recipe going back three generations. Polish Christmas keks, teacake or fruitcake, is lighter and more delicate than its English counterpart, though its name is derived from English Christmas cake.

A different take on a Christmas pudding, with carrots and dates, baked instead of steamed. A cross between a carrot and date cake, a lighter sticky toffee pudding, baked not steamed, sauce still served – this is the one to try.

Christmas Stollen with homemade marzipan. Stollen tastes absolutely divine when still warm from the oven but it keeps very well. The German Christmas bread symbolised baby Jesus swaddled in clothing

Cinnamon swirl marble cake: a recipe for an easy pound cake with cocoa and cinnamon added to one portion of the batter. It can be baked in a loaf, bundt or a round tin but the lemon glaze is a must.

Coconut angel food cake, with a zesty touch of lime flavour. Angel food cake base, whipped coconut cream filling and toasted coconut flakes to decorate.

Super easy coconut loaf made with shredded coconut. This must be the quickest cake in the world. I wish I could say it is also the finest but the two things rarely go hand in hand.

Courgette loaf cake or what to do with courgette glut. Let’s be honest here: this is no Great Bake Off contest entry. It’s fairly bland, similarly to the vegetable; will benefit from vanilla, cinnamon, nutmeg, almond essence, lemon zest and whatever other flavourings you can think of.

Cranberry and walnut bread made with fresh or frozen cranberries, chopped walnuts and orange juice and zest, it has intense flavour, gorgeous cranberry tang and crunchy sugar topping.

Sticky cranberry gingerbread cake with molasses and maple syrup. Easy to make, sweet, spicy and tart, it's just perfect for the festive season.

Crème fraiche pound cake flavoured with vanilla, baked in two mini loaf tins. Simply adorable – with crème fraiche icing too.

Devil’s food cake with hazelnut praline and mascarpone cream is unbelievably good. Just the recipe for the next birthday occasion.