Ruby Bhogal is an enormously accomplished and inventive baker, as anyone who saw her on GBBO or has read her debut cookbook, One Bake Two Ways knows — and Around the World in 80 Cakes is the perfect showcase for her enquiring mind and imaginative palate. Skilled bakers will find inspiration in these pages, but there is much for the nervous novice, too. Chapters cover cakes from Africa, Asia, Europe, Oceania and The Americas, and to every cake she brings us from these regions she adds her own distinctive twist. There is a saying about life that everything is either a lesson or a blessing, and I’d say the recipes in this book manage to be both at the same time!
As cooler days are upon us, I can think of worse projects than to bake our way around the world with Bhogal, ticking off all 80, but let me for now just bring you a couple or so cakes from each chapter to let you know what sweet happiness is in store: South African Malva Pudding; West African Lime Cake; Indian Milk Cake; Filipino Sans Rival; Thai Khanom Badin aka Butter Cake; Austrian Sachertorte; French Fraisier Cake; a very much not-your-basic British Victoria Sponge; Greek Portokalopita; Hungarian Esterházy Torte; Ukrainian Kyiv Cake; Australian Lamingtons; Fijian Honey Cake; Caribbean Black Cake; Brazilian Bolo de Brigadeiro; Boston Cream Pie; Jamaican Hummingbird Cake; Argentinian Chocotorta; and Brooklyn Blackout Cake. After much delicious rumination, the recipe I decided to share with you today is the gorgeously inviting Mexican Pastel Imposible aka Chocoflan — and despite its title, Bhogal shows you how very possible it is!
Around The World in 80 Cakes by Ruby Bhogal (Pavilion, £26) is out now.
Photos by Matt Russell.
