Those who bake, what's your motivation for doing it?

[JoshandJamie]

Am having a bit of a philosophical debate with a friend about why mums bake. So can you tell me why you do home baking?

Here are some suggestions but want to know which is your main reason - or perhaps it's something else altogether:

• it's a fun thing to do with the kids
• it tastes better than store bought stuff
• you know what's in it
• because of the memories it conjures up - like when you were a kid and got to lick the spoon
• because it makes you feel just a bit like a domestic goddess
• because your mum taught you how to bake and now you want to pass that onto your kids

Other reasons??

dizzydixies - No you're not alone, scoffing a batch of home made biscuits doesn't make me feel as guilty as scoffing a packet of bought ones.
Home made biscuits can often last longer than bought ones too as I know home much effort went into making them so I savour them more.

I like knowing what went into them, using good quality ingredients, and not really sticking to recipes.

I just enjoy baking. In our house it's a sociable activity. DP makes bread a couple of times a week, I make biscuits, 7mo DD looks on bemused.
When she was very little I'd bake at "Grump o'clock" she was only happy if she was being carried around so I would bake with her strapped to me in her carry pouch.
I think she'll grow up with an innate ability to make chocolate chip cookies

bilblio - she sounds like my dd2 was and I've just gone down to the kitchen as I could smell something rather pleasant - whole oat crunchies have just come out of the oven {she's 11 now btw). So you may be right in your predictions

I think it's great, my dds don't even ask when they want to bake, as long as they clear up afterwards I don't mind what they do....

Thank you NAB. I had already ordered some blueberries from Tesco online with my shopping that will arrive tomorrow and then I saw what you were making.

Will do them on Sat.

I choose to bake
Because I love cake
The smell and the taste
Adds inches to my waist
x

Tastes far better and portions bigger than shop cakes.

Was brought up entirely on home baking so sort of pre-conditioned to think that's the way cakes should be.

When stuck at home, actually it's easier to get the mixer out and make scones or muffins than pack DC's into car and go to shops.

Am not very good at baking, have extremely limited repertoire, but really do enjoy making it myself.

1. The taste - at times in my life when I have not been able to bake I have sought out fetes with home-made cake stalls.
2. Because my mum bakes.
3. It is so satisfying to put a tin full of goo into the oven and take out a cake.

NQC. recipe for pumpkin cake please..they were one of our great successes on the allotment, Riverford send them regularly in the veg box and I do struggle to use them all. Cake would be much appreciated.

My daughter makes wonderful cakes, just like her grandmother. Mine, however, are always dry and hard on the top. Any remedies? Can I please blame my cooker as I hate to think it's my lack of skills

Earthy - I do riverford too and I generally use them for soups as it makes them really velvety

We had leek, cabbage and squashy/ pumpkin this week and it was lush

it is relaxing and you get something yummy at the end of it and my dh loves me for it

I just love the taste of fresh cake. And I inherited my gran's Kenwood Chef, which is like something from the ark, and she was a domestic science teacher, so it must be in my genes.

I just find it endlessly fascinating, that you take some extremely bland tasting ingredients (flour, butter, sugar) and turn then into such glorious tasting finished products. And so many variations of end products from the same basic ingredients

And as many people have said, passing on these skills down through the generations, gives my children a connection to my mother, my grandmother, my great grandmother and so on...

yes I do like cheap

and it also feels more special than buying cake

The process of baking something is very calming. It's methodical and absorbing. I go into a world of my own.

it tastes great.

its really relaxing, you can think out all sorts of problems while baking and at the end of it you have yummy things to eat.

it makes my husband deeply, pathetically grateful and want to have lots of sex with me.

grannyslippers - your comment about being brought up on home made cakes made me remmeber something. When I was at school 2 girls in my class ALWAYS used to swap the cakes in their lunchboxes. One had homemade cakes, the other had Mr Kipling or some other shop bought cake. Just made me laugh, kids are so contrary!

Got yourself some great market research for free here Josh and Jamie

I have just started the baking thing. So far, i can only do easy stuff, but want to do more.

I don't want my kids to grow up thinking that baking/cooking=impossible

As children we thought shop bought cakes were really exotic. We rarely had them. Even today I get a frisson of excitement at the sight of a bit of shop bought Battenburg or a French Fancy.

Ooh, Fennel, Konditor and Cook (the best cake shop bar none in London) does a very special - and lurid - line in Fondant Fancies.

I find it really relaxing to bake.

I bake all our goodies.

It tastes better than shop bought stuff and I don't like the taste of shop bought stuff, either.

check out the magic cakes

I work just around the corner from the Gray's Inn Rd one now, mi. Yum!

The coffee walnut K&C cake counts as one of the most divine sensory experiences of my entire life. And I've been around a bit.

It tastes better than shop bought.
Its cheaper.
I can alter recipes and use whats in the cupboard.
We can pick our own berries in summer for muffins.
Its an activity my kids love to do.
I love to invent imaginative birthday cakes for my boys (but SIL says she gets 'proper' cakes from a shop!!)
It impresses mil who has never baked
No nasty trans or hydrogenated fats, just butter or corn oil.
Can put less sugar in.
It lets my boys know that food gets MADE, not just bought in boxes from shops.
Its fresh
Its tasty

My Baking is bloomin' delicious!! And once you've had home made you can tell the difference.

Finally its fab to eat a cake or whatever that doesn't come in a box telling you how much fat and calories are in it

I'll check it out .

Just don't tell them on the bootcamp thread (from which I have gone AWOL anyway).