Nigel Slater's Best Brownies. Heaven in a tin. The fudgy moist centre is the aim. 

300g caster sugar

250g butter

250g chocolate (70% cocoa solids)

3 large eggs plus 1 extra yolk

50g gluten free flour (60g plain wheat flour)

60g cocoa powder

½ tsp baking powder

Preheat oven to 180ºC and line a baking tin with greaseproof paper. 

Mix the sugar and butter into a fluffy pale cloud. Set aside 50g of the chocolate (chop it up into gravel-sized pieces) and melt the rest - 20 seconds at time in the microwave, stirring after each blast. Meanwhile sift together the flour, cocoa, and baking powder with a pinch of salt.

Mix the beaten eggs into the sugar and butter fluff, a quarter at a time. Beat fast in between additions. Add the melted chocolate and the broken up chocolate (i used white chocolate in this version) then fold in the flour/cocoa and baking powder mixture as gently as possible. 

Put the mixture into the cake tin and put it into the oven for 25 minutes. The surface should have crusted over, but with a wobble underneath. Check with a skewer - if too much mixture clings then put it back for 3 more minutes, but no longer. 

I knew it would not be long before i returned to the Queen of Baking: 

Nigella's Chocolate Expresso Cake 

150g dark chocolate

150g butter

6 eggs

250g caster sugar

1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

75g plain flour

5 teaspoons instant expresso powder

4 tablespoons Tia Maria

Melt the chocolate and butter together (I use the microwave, stirring every 15 seconds or so) and leave to cool slightly. 

Beat eggs, caster sugar and vanilla until thick and mousse-like and doubled (at least) in volume. 

Gently fold in flour (I used gluten-free, and you wouldn't know it from the outcome) and instant expresso powder and then the melted chocolate and butter. Pour in to a 23cm springform tin (buttered and lined) and bake at 180ºC for a mere 35 minutes until the top is just firm. Immediately pour over the Tia Maria and allow to cool totally before taking out of the tin. The centre will sink and dimple, but this is a good sign that the moist brownie texture is safe.

If you have the inclination, or the occasion, whip a little double cream with a slug of bailey's cream to serve alongside; rich, sweet with a hint of liqueur to heighten the hit of mocha. For a glamorous sight, pile the cream into the centre of the cake before slicing carefully. 

Adapted from Tamasin Day Lewis' Kitchen Classics; my gluten free cake version of a sticky toffee pudding (nut free too!)

• 55g unsalted butter
• 200g light soft sugar

Melt the butter in a heavy bottomed pan. As it is almost completely melted, add the sugar and hover over a low heat, stirring briskly, until the sugar dissolves into the butter. Leave off the heat for a minute or two.

• 1 teaspoon vanilla essence
• 1 egg, beaten

Add the essence and the egg, stir. The mixture will immediately loosen in the pan.

Stir in a sifted mix of:

• 100g gluten free flour
• 1 level teaspoon baking powder
• a pinch of sea salt

and finally add:

• 120g pitted dates, scissored into half

Line a small loaf pan (i use a 900g tin, but a smaller pan will give you a thicker brownie) and carefully dollop in the mixture. Bake for 25 minutes, but check at 20 mins .. a skewer will be barely clean but the top should look crisp. Leave for at least 10 minutes to cool before removing from the tin and slicing, greedily.

Another loaf cake. My kitchen doesn't feel right without a frilled and fragrant gentle brick of cake on the window sill. This is a prime candidate for frequent revisiting. My first attempt was with standard flour, but I will try it with gluten-free flour without hesitation.

Nigella Lawson's Chocolate Orange Loaf Cake

• 150g soft unsalted butter
• 30ml golden syrup
• 175g dark muscovado sugar

I have a handy scale which measures ml so i can pour sticky syrup directly into the beating bowl, otherwise use 2x 15ml spoonfuls. Beat the soft butter with the syrup and sugar - a good 5 minutes, until you have a consistent and appealing coffee-coloured batter. 

try resisting dipping a finger ...

• 150g plain flour
• 1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
• 25g cocoa powder, sifted
• 2 eggs

Mix dry ingredients together and beat 1 tablespoon into the butter cream, then beat in one egg. Add 2 more tablespoons of the flour mix and beat again before adding the second egg.

• zest of 2 medium oranges, juice of 1 orange

Keeping the paddle moving, add the zest of the oranges and then the juice, slowly.

Pour and scrape the batter into the tin and bake for 45 minutes. It may need 5 minutes less or more .. do check. A cake tester should not be totally clean. Leave in the tin to cool slightly.

The flavour is, as Nigella says, more of warm spice than citrus.

utterly moist

It is a crumble, the best crust for a dish of cooked bramleys and blackberries, and doesn't seem to care that i used gluten-free flour.

100g flour

75g butter

50g sugar

Whizz in a food processor for a few seconds to make a crumb. Scatter over your choice of fruit and bake in a medium hot oven until crisp, about 25 minutes.

I prefer mine served warm, with hot custard.

A fine piece of belly pork.

I sliced the fat with a sharp blade, rubbed salt pepper and lemon thyme into the creases. 30 minutes at 230ºC, then an hour or so at 180º. It didn't need an extra blast at the heat, the crackling was done to perfection.

Yes, this is more banana than courgette, but it must be the healthiest cake ever betwixt my lips. Gluten free, fat free. I used tight little currants instead of the suggested nuts. Very light to eat, excellent not-to-sweet fuel for breakfast, and keeps well too.

Cinnamon Banana Bread, by Harry Eastwood (recipe also found here)

Use a barrel grater .. it is the only reasonable way of getting finely grated vegetables without destroying your knuckles and your sense of humour. I always bake this sort of damp cake in a paper case to avoid the extra work of greasing the tin.

Rhubarb & Fresh Ginger Crumble Cake, Adapted from Tamasin Day Lewis' Kitchen Classics.

Crumble

110g plain flour

4 tablespoons light muscovado sugar

85g unsalted butter

Pulse the ingredients together briefly until they stick together in a gravelly fashion.

Fruit

750g rhubarb, cut into 1cm chunks

2 tablespoons vanilla caster sugar

1 inch (thumb knuckle size) of dried ginger root, finely grated.

Toss the rhubarb, sugar and ginger pulp together. Use ground ginger if you wish - a teaspoon or so - but the dried root, with its papery skin which i don't bother to peel, has a particular fresh flavour that works best.


Cake

170g softened, unsalted butter

170g vanilla caster sugar

3 eggs, beaten

170g plain flour

2 tsp baking powder

1 tablespoon milk

Beat the butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well and adding a spoon of sifted flour if the mixture looks like curdling. Sift in the rest of the flour and baking powder, folding carefully and firmly. Fold in the milk.

Scrape the mixture into a 25cm springform cake tin, base lined with baking parchment. Pile the rhubarb on the batter, then sprinkle the crumble over the top. Bake for an hour at 190ºC.





The crumble will be golden, crunchy and smelling of sweet butter.

Leave to cool for 15 minutes and eat warm with cream, although just as delicious cold, later.

This is easy, quick and deeply satisfying.

It is not baking, but it might be alchemy.

Line a deep baking tray (26 x 31 x 2.5 cm) with baking parchment.

Melt 200g good dark chocolate and 100g unsalted butter in a large bowl over gently simmering water, stirring until combined.

Fold in 350g condensed milk and 250g grated coconut

(gently toasted in a large dry pan) and 200g glace cherries, chopped.

Spoon the mixture into the prepared tray and spread into an even layer.

Chill in the 'fridge for 4-5 hours, then cut into small squares.

Store in the fridge between nibbling.

... as easy as pie.

Eat hot, warm or cold as a stolen slice straight from the fridge. This is comfort food that is easy on effort, so very simple, and fills little and big tummies equally happily. I added sharks to my pie crust; a pie without frivolous embellishment is somehow naked.

Sophie Grigson's Sausage and Apple Pie

Take a 450g packet of ready-made puff pastry (if you will. Make your own if you have the urge). Cut the block in half and roll one piece to generously line a shallow 9 inch pie plate.

Take a quantity of good sausage meat (a 450g packet of fat sausages cut from their skins is an excellent choice) and spread evenly across the pastry sheet. Season with pepper, nutmeg andfresh chopped sage (3 or 4 leaves). Peel, core and slice 2 large eating apples and arrange the slices evenly across the sausage meat. Season again with pepper and nutmeg.

Roll out the remaining pastry to form the lid. Beat an egg yolk with a tablespoon of cold water and brush the edges of the pie pastry with the egg wash and lay the lid on top. Press the edges together to seal, and trim the excess. Make a hole in the centre of the lid to let the steam out, and chill in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Put a baking tray in the oven and preheat the oven to 220ºC.

Brush the pastry with the egg wash (after adding fish or otherwise-shaped motifs) just before popping in the oven on top of the baking tray so the base gets an instant blast of heat. After 15 minutes, reduce the heat to 180ºC and cook for another 30-40 minutes until the apple is tender.

It looks very plain - even with a gold candle stuck in the middle of it - but the aroma (citrus cocoa) and the dark, glossy sheen is sophisticated and tempting. Eat with a fork, with perhaps a little cream added for glamour. Perfect for serving at the end of a meal; moist with a lightness from the copious fruit. Almost one of your 5-a-day.

Nigella Lawson's Chocolate Orange Cake

Start the day before, simmering 2 whole oranges in water for 2 hours. Painless.

The next day pulse the entire oranges (removing any obvious pips), and beat with eggs, sugar, cocoa and almond meal.

It doesn't get any easier.



6 large eggs in a bowl.




Add 1 heaped teaspoon baking powder, half a teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda, 200g ground almonds, 250g caster sugar and 50g cocoa.




Take the two boiled, drained and cooled oranges, cut in half and remove any pips. Pulse in a blender to a grainy pulp - you need about 375g, but i didn't measure mine and it worked perfectly regardless. Add orange to the other ingredients and beat together to a thick batter with flecks of orange. Pour in to a 20cm springform cake tin, base lined. Bake at 180ºC for 45 minutes, cover with a layer of foil and continue cooking for about 15 minutes or so. Allow to fully cool in the tin.

Yes, this was all that was left when i finally got around to taking a photo ..

For late-night pudding or with morning coffee, spread with cream cheese or plain; however you like it, eat this.

Nigella Lawson's Dense Chocolate Loaf Cake

225g soft unsalted butter
375g dark muscovado sugar
2 large eggs, beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
100g best chocolate, melted
200g plain flour
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
250ml boiling water

Preheat the oven to 190ºC, put in a baking sheet to catch the drips (it will drip, if not flood) and line a loaf tin (23 x 13 x 7cm).

I find muscovado sugar can have persistent lumps - beat it first to break it up well. Then add butter and cream well, followed by eggs and vanilla.









I love to see beaten butter.

Fold in the melted and slightly cooled chocolate - don't over beat, then gently fold in the flour, to which you have added the bicarb, alternately spoon by spoon, with the boiling water until you have a smooth and loose batter.

Pour the mocca river into the lined tin and bake for 30 minutes. Turn the oven down to 170ºC and continue to cook for another 15 minutes. It may need a little longer if the batter still wobbles in the tin. Check with a skewer but it should be squidgy inside.

Allow to cool completely before turning out of the tin. It will have sunk slightly in the middle.

Late at night, drunk, and i ran out of dark chocolate, so the latest log has a white chocolate buttercream. Lush.

The only cooking reference i have for these are some brief notes copied from a book read at a friend's kitchen table - i don't remember which book, or even the name of the cupcakes. I changed the principle flavour from orange to lemon, and swopped a flaked almond topping for a juicier icing.



2 eggs
90g caster sugar
grated zest of 1 lemon
80g gluten-free flour
80g ground almonds

Heat oven to 170ºC.

Whisk the eggs and sugar for 15 minutes (seriously), until thick and foamy.

Add the zest, ground almonds and flour and blend briefly.

Spoon into paper cases, and bake for 22 minutes precisely.

For the icing i added 2 heaped tablespoons of Very Ginger Curd to a batch of plain buttercream. The flavour is citrus with small delicate flashes of heat from stem ginger. The entire batch lasted about 20 minutes from oven to belly.