Finding La Dolce Vita on the Aeolian Islands

As well as the ultimate street snacks, the Sicilians have also perfected the art of pastry. Like me, they have a very sweet tooth.

I can't believe I've never tried a cannoli until now. Pastry tubes, filled with a sweetened ricotta and often flavoured with chocolate or pistachio.

We hired a moped for a near-death ride into Lipari from our campsite in order to pick up an array of sweet treats from the best 'pastriccerie' on the Aeolian islands - Bar Pasticceria Subba on Lipari. Totally worth battling oncoming Italian drivers on the narrow winding roads for these...

Blueberry Hill Cakes kitchen opening party - champagne, cake and more cake

The lovely Rachel and Ella from Blueberry Hill Cakes were kind enough to invite me to the opening party for their new kitchen last night. It's an exciting time for this small company - until last month the girls were creating cakes for weddings, parties, farmer's markets and even Harrods in Ella's flat. This is their first commercial kitchen which means they can now fulfil orders in a fully kitted out space... and Ella is no longer living amongst boxes, baking tins and cupcake cases!

Rachel and Ella had made a whole host of cakes for the celebration - mini pink stacked cakes, raspberry swirled meringues, their signature chocolate brownies and, my favourite, the tiniest gingerbread men I have ever seen.

For beauty alone, the spread was impressive - especially given the girls had been in the kitchen since 6am that morning to sort that day's orders (wedding cakes, birthday cakes, afternoon tea deliveries...) Luckily it tasted pretty special too.

All washed down with lots of champagne of course.

We also attempted to decorate our own cupcakes... it started fairly sensibly until my husband got involved and created a Mr Whippy version.

And finally, here's some more pictures of their wonderful cakes, in case you haven't been drooling enough...

Rachel and Ella also specialise in delivering afternoon teas direct to your door. So you can experience the luxury of high tea - a great British institution - in the comfort of your own home. Blueberry Hill afternoon teas start from just £15pp and include scones, sandwiches, cakes, bubbly and more. Especially for the Jubilee, they will also deliver an afternoon tea direct to your picnic spot - in four central London parks... all you need to bring is a blanket! What better way to celebrate HRH's 60 year reign...

If this has whetted your appetite for cake, you can sample Blueberry Hill's delights (including a special Jubilee range of cakes, biscuits and gingerbread) in London's Wholefoods stores, or place an order through their website www.blueberryhillcakes.co.uk

Easy peasy banana and cinnamon cake

This is my fail-safe recipe for banana cake.. I'm not exactly sure where it came from, I've had it for years, scribbled on a couple of yellow post it notes... see below... One day I will get round to writing my recipes out on beautifully lined, scented paper or something, but until then, scraps of paper shoved in a ring binder will have to do...

The original recipe states to bake the cake in a loaf tin for 40 mins at 180C before reducing the temperature to 150C for a further 30mins. This time round I used mini loaf tins (of the cardboard variety). I followed the same recipe as below but baked them for 20 mins at 180C. The recipe makes one large loaf tin sized cake or 10 mini loaves...

Jane's chocolate cake - officially the most amazing chocolate cake ever...

OK, so with a title like that, this cake had better live up to expectations...

The recipe is from Jane - a family friend - and I have been eating this cake for birthdays and special occasions for most of my life.. and yes, I even had it as my Wedding cake. I had originally suggested having a Wedding cake shaped like a lobster (because I love the beast yet we could not afford to feed all our guests real lobster). However, this idea was vetoed and instead the cake was heart shaped (admittedly much more romantic and Wedding-appropriate) and covered with Gullian sea shells (and a plastic lobster!) to subdue my crustacean cravings.

Admittedly it's a fair bit more work than a simple all-in-one chocolate sponge but I promise you the results are more than worth the effort... the resulting cake is sticky, densely chocolatey and utterly moreish. Don't cheat on the icing either, it might seem like an extra slog to make proper ganache instead of a quick buttercream but it really is the icing on the cake (scuse the pun)

The best wedding cake ever!

The recipe for this little beauty is below...

Ingredients:
For the cake...
- 9oz plain flour
- 4 oz drinking chocolate
- 6 oz margarine
- 6oz golden syrup
- 3 oz soft brown sugar
- 2 x eggs
- 7oz milk
- 3/4 tsp bicarbonate of soda

For the chocolate ganache...
- 200g double cream
- 200g good quality chocolate

To start, make sure you have 2 sandwich tins greased and lined. Melt the margarine, syrup and sugar in a saucepan and then add to the sieved flour and chocolate powder. Add the beaten eggs and whisk. The mixture will be very thick at this stage - and I have a tendency to cover myself and my kitchen with thick chocolate mixture (although I'm sure the cake will work just as well if you miss this stage out).

Heat the milk to blood temperature (i.e. just lukewarm) and then ad to the bicarb. Add the milk mixture to the chocolate and whisk thoroughly. The mix will now be very runny (it's supposed to be).

Split the chocolate mixture between the two sandwich tins and cook at 150C for 40 - 50 minutes (or until a skewer comes out clean).

To make the ganache, you need equal parts of double cream and good quality chocolate (I use one bar of green and blacks dark chocolate and one of their milk bars). Heat the double cream until it's nearly boiling then remove from the heat. Add the chocolate (broken into small pieces). The heat from the cream will melt it. Leave to cool and then whisk until thick. Smother your cake and then lick the bowl clean.

Enjoy with cream, ice cream, or just on its own with a cup of tea.

Leiths day one - squid , chorizo and orange & almond cake

Tonight was day one of a cookery course I signed up to at Leiths. On the menu was a warm salad of pan fried squid and chorizo with chickpeas, lemon and rocket.

We were taught how to prepare the squid (and the art of removing its innards without puncturing the ink sac) and how to pan fry it to perfection (only turn it once and cook for 3 minutes max).

 Next up was an orange and almond cake... made with rice flour, semolina and orange pulp (heated for 10 minutes and then blitzed in a blender). The cakes were left to cool and then an orange and cointreau syrup added to the top. The result is a deliciously buttery, moist cake that I have just devoured.

Next Monday's update... cerviche of sea bass, and greek parsley pasta with wild mushrooms, spinach and warm red salsa.