Gingerbread Biscoff Cake

As it's probably clear from all of my baking posts: I'm really scared of taking risks in the kitchen. I know what I'm good at - and what I'm comfortable making - and generally stick to it. Yes, I'll branch out on the odd occasion (Technical Thursdays are definitely the exception and not the rule!), but on the whole I have a very narrow repertoire.

I don't quite know why I did it, but when my turn came to provide a cake for Cake Club at work, I decided to take a chance on a recipe I'd stumbled across on the BBC Good Food website instead of sticking to something I was confident with. It ended up being one of the best cakes I've ever made, sparked a bizarre debate on the score (Cake Club is very serious, and there was a lot of discussion as to whether it was a 9.8 or a 10, but I'd have been delighted with either!) and I knew I had to make it again the following week so my family would have the opportunity to try it.

Behold, the Gingerbread Biscoff Cake: a three layered monster of light gingerbread sponge and decadent caramel biscuit cream cheese icing. It. Is. Amazing.

Simnel Muffins

I've never made a Simnel Cake.

It's been on my list of things to bake for quite literally years, but I've never actually got round to buying the ingredients and giving it a go. I even have a Mary Berry recipe on stand-by, but at this stage I'd all but given up on trying it out. That's when I found this recipe for Simnel Muffins on the BBC Good Food website, and after a quick read through decided it was too perfect to purely leave bookmarked for the future.

These muffins are positively bursting with flavour - they have all of the best qualities of a traditional Simnel Cake - but are much lighter, and in muffin form they're a lot more fun to make!

Raspberry & White Chocolate Easter Cake

As much as I love baking, I'm the most unadventurous person in the world.

I don't experiment. At all. Yes, I'll try new recipes and attempt to challenge myself, but when it comes to even slightly straying from the instructions I panic and completely refuse. Technical Thursdays meant I tried recipes for things I'd never heard of and could barely pronounce, but I followed the instructions to the letter. I have lots of ideas for recipes but never have the courage to try them out, but for some reason I'm feeling vaguely brave at the moment, so decided to transform an annotated doodle of a cake on a post-it note into reality.

For full disclaimer: this is a baby step and not nearly as impressive as it sounds! I worked out exactly how I wanted the cake to look, then trawled through the BBC Good Food website to find various recipes that I could mix together to make it happen.

The Raspberry & White Chocolate Easter Cake was born, combining a duck egg sponge with tart raspberry jam, a white chocolate buttercream and enough Mini Eggs to potentially single-handedly keep Cadbury's in business this year. Boom.

(Boozy) Paddington Pudding

Paddington Bear may hail from deepest darkest Peru but he's a British national treasure.

The new controversially-rated film, Paddington, (the BBFC bizarrely recently classified it as a PG...) featuring a selection of British acting royalty and Ben Whishaw as the voice of the famous bear is released in UK cinemas today. Given the fact that I sadly don't have time to watch it on the opening weekend, I thought I'd do a spot of Paddington-themed baking instead and put a trip to the cinema at the top of my to-do list for next week.

Everyone knows Paddington loves marmalade almost as much as Pooh loves honey, and it's the time of year when there's nothing better than curling up on the sofa with a bowl of steaming hot pudding. It therefore seemed like a bit of a no brainer to play around with good old-fashioned bread and butter pudding and give it a cheeky Paddington twist.

I managed to unearth a jar of Seville orange marmalade from the back of a cupboard and found this recipe for a Marmalade & Whisky Bread & Butter Pudding on the BBC Good Food website. Paddington has been so well received thus far that critics are raving about it, and the general consensus is that grown ups will love it as much as children - hence why I've tried out a recipe that has the option to include whisky, turning a childhood favourite into a truly grown-up dessert if so desired.

Self-Saucing Jaffa Pudding

For me, there's no better way to spend a lazy Sunday than baking.

Despite weather forecasts predicting sun and warm temperatures over the coming week, we're definitely moving into autumn even though Britain is desperately clinging onto summer. However there's no denying the fact that we're heading towards a season of beautiful fallen leaves, evenings curled up under blankets watching Downton Abbey and the inevitable exciting countdown to Christmas.

As the nights become colder and darker there's nothing better this time of year than being a bit naughty and occasionally indulging in good old fashioned comfort food. Step forward the Self-Saucing Jaffa Pudding, the answer to all your autumn comfort food needs in the form of a rich chocolate-orange sponge floating on top of a thick chocolate sauce. Served steaming hot with a dollop of ice cream it's the ideal accompaniment to a night in on the sofa binge watching your favourite show.