Welcome to Kitchen Queries, where the nigella.com team will answer your cooking or food related questions.  We’d love you to submit some of your recipe problems, dilemmas or queries for us to get our teeth into!

Please note, we are only able to answer questions selected for publication and aren't able to enter into personal correspondence.

• Sinking loaf cakes

  In Nigella's latest book, Kitchen, the loaf cakes on pages 136 296 and 308 have clearly sunk in the middle. Surely that cannot be how you expect them to be served? Is this simply a bad batch and there was no time to recook before taking photos or are these cakes really meant to be sunk in the middle? I have never seen any seed cake or loaf cake which had sunk in the middle in any other cookbook. 

  I've now attempted the chocolate orange loaf cake from "Kitchen" twice now and on both occasions the cake has sunk spectacularly on taking out of the oven. I've followed the quantities and recipe exactly and normally have no problem with my cake baking. Can you let me know what is going wrong? Cazl

  Posted by herogirl. Answered on 20th Feb 2011 at 12.00

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• Chicken breasts always dry!

  I love Nigella's Kitchen and she has actually converted me to using chicken thighs but I do enjoy chicken breasts, but everytime I cook them they always go so dry - even sometimes with marinades. Do you have any tips on how I can get tender and juicy chicken breasts? Thanks!

  Posted by kellyhowells. Answered on 20th Feb 2011 at 12.00

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• Where does one find garlic oil please?

  Nigella often recommends garlic oil. However, it is not available in our local shops. Moreover homemade garlic oil can be dangerous as it can cause botulinism. So how can I acquire it please?

  Posted by felix. Answered on 19th Feb 2011 at 12.00

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