NOW CLOSED Talk to Stork about your favourite things to bake, and discuss 'Bake Brave' for World Baking Day 2013. £100 Baking hamper to be won

[KatieBMumsnet]

World Baking Day is on Sunday 19th of May and to coincide with this Stork would love to hear what you think of this year's theme "Bake Brave".

Stork say: "World Baking Day is a global event sponsored by Stork and the theme for 2013 is to 'Bake Brave'. From novice to master baker, food blogger to food celebrity, World Baking Day has been introduced to inspire people to step out of their baking comfort zone and master a cake they've never baked before."

For this year's theme, 100 recipes of varying difficulty have been developed and can be found here

Please take a look at the recipes and come back to this thread to let us know what you think. Which recipe would you try to 'Bake Brave' with? Are there any that you've already mastered?

Please also share your favourite treats to bake as well as any top baking tips you may have for other MNers or for getting kids into baking.

Everyone who shares their thoughts on this thread will be entered into a prize draw, where one MNer will win a £100 Baking hamper filled with sweet treats and baking goodies.

Thanks and good luck,

MNHQ

[SarahAndFuck]

I have two old Be-Ro recipe books that belonged to my Grandma and one has a note she wrote advising that all the recipes work best with Stork.

I like to make the chocolate cake, which she always made for our birthdays when we were little, and Ive followed her advice and kept to Stork for all of it.

But we will be having a birthday dinner with my Dad on the 19th and I think I'm going to make the Sour Almond Cake for him, I think he'll really like it.

[Kellz92]

I love baking many things but I do like making caramel shortcake even though my hubby eats them all. also love making a banoffee pie x

[forcookssake]

My tip is to get some of the reuseable baking parchment and cut out liners for all your cake tins, so you can bake at a moment's notice AND have a cake that turns out easily with a smooth bottom

[flippinada]

To those wondering if you can still get the be-ro book, yes you can - and it only costs £2.50. I have it and it's ace.

bero book!

[theressomethingaboutmarie]

The dark chocolate torte with orange syrup and ice cream looks fab - I'd give that a go. I generally bake cakes and tarts (treacle, bake well, butterscotch, pecan and chocolate etc). My DD joins in sometimes, although her choice is our now perfected, chocolate chip cookie recipe.

The best way to get children baking is to start off with something you know they'll like that isn't too sticky (my daughter hates getting sticky hands) or buy an array of biscuit cutters that appeal to your children and go from there.

[BornToFolk]

I think it's a great concept and there seem to be some good recipes on the site but, good grief, that's an irritating webiste to navigate! Far too busy.

Anyway, I'd probably give the banana muffins a go...though I would use butter...sorry Stork!

[Pancakeflipper]

I bake 3 times a week because my DS2 is dairy-free and cos' Stork in the gold wrapper is dairy-free it means we have lots of cakes .

Our current fav is a carrot and coconut cake because you can make it in 1 big pan then into a cake tin and into the oven. It's sweet and yummy.

I love you Stork and so do my children. You have helped to produce many a fine birthday cake in our household.

[MaureenMLove]

Well, this is my kinda website! There are far too many wonderful looking cakes to chose a favourite, so I went straight to the top and I'd love to give 100 a go!

I figure if you're going to try something new, you may as well aim high!

I'm sure I've got loads of tips, but most of the thing I do, when making cakes, I just do and don't know if that's what others do anyway.

DD has been baking for ever, so I guess one of my tips is get them at it early! She's 17 now and because she's competent and confident in the kitchen, I can leave her to do the baking and I just do the eating! A favourite is good old fashioned scones. It's great to be able to suddenly want fresh scones and send DD off to make them and be eating them a little of 30 mins later!

Another tip, is make sure you have a good larder full of ingredients, from dried fruit, to chocolate slabs and nuts, along with the fridge ingredients. That way, you can be sure that when you suddenly feel the urge to bake, you can find at least one recipe that fits your ingredients.

[MyNameIsInigoMontoya]

I like the sound of the courgette and feta muffins as a change from all the sweet stuff, I usually only bake cakes and similar!

No real tips on getting kids into baking apart from, just do it! They always seem to love it.

[BellaVita]

I love baking and always use Stork.

In fact I made a Victoria sponge for work a couple of weeks ago and the boss's secretary accused me of putting a secret ingredient into the mixture. She really wouldn't believe me when I said it was good old Stork that I use.

I am a hoarder of baking books

[Bunbaker]

DD (12) and I both love baking. Last week she made some Cookie Monster cupcakes and Minnie Mouse cupcakes for her friend's birthday party. One of her friends took pictures of them and loaded them on to Instagram whereupon she got several "likes" straight away. DD was ever so pleased about her 5 minutes of fame.

[OrangeFootedScrubfowl]

The website is very cute. That fluorescent jelly cake looks weird, 37, I might try that!!
(It's nearly all cakes I noticed. Just the way it should be.)

[TheReturnoftheSmartArse]

There's always baking going on in our house. I have 2 teenage DDs and a DS of 9. DS is mainly interested in eating the results and the girls hate him getting involved as his hands are always filthy, but the DDs use any old excuse for baking and both always make cakes for friends' or teachers' birthdays. In fact, DD1 has become so famous for her cakes that her friends now ask her to make their birthday cake rather than give them a gift.

I slightly resent their constant baking, because it means I have less opportunity to do so - they now do the weekend bake for the lunchboxes and after school snacks (flapjack, savoury muffins, that sort of thing). I find baking incredibly relaxing - after a horrid day at work, there's nothing better than getting the mixing bowls out and creating something out of whatever there is in the cupboard. So I now mainly make tarts for pudding. Kneading pastry is very therapeutic! I stick to whatever fruit I have from the garden, usually. Last night we had rhubarb, custard and meringue tartlets: pastry cases filled thick custard (made with marscapone), stewed rhubarb, and topped with meringue.

I always use stork for baking as it isn't strongly flavoured, is cheaper than butter and always seems to get good results.

[Pluckybird]

flapjack is an all time favourite, and have recently discovered a fab recipe which replaces the syrup with old over ripe bananas - saves throwing them away and uses less sugar! silicone baking "tray" a must though...

[Boggler]

Our favourite recipe basically because its quick and easy is cinnamon and raisin muffins

[ChocolateMama]

I am getting quite adept at baking buns for the school bake sales, but looking at these receipes has really inspired me. Think it has brought my competitive side out, and may try the 'colour frenzy' for the next bake sale. Baking is suprisingly easy once you get going, and 'always' tastes better than shop bought in my opinion.

[DifferentNow]

The receipes look delicious. I'm a competent baker and bake with good results pretty much every time, howewer I would like to brush up on my decoration skills and move on from tasty home baking to being able to produce more elegant cakes. I'm thinking of doing a class. On the World Baking Day website, I like the look of the Strawberry and Turkish Delight Cakes.

I use Stork already rather than butter whenever I can as I find it produces much lighter cakes and tastes just the same. My kids, like most kids love baking and I explain the techniques that we are using when we bake together.

[DifferentNow]

*recipes

[Blatherskite]

I'm surprised biscuits are 'braver' than cheesecake. I find biscuits easy and yet getting an un-cracked, un-gritty cheesecake can be quite tough.

I really fancy the Banana Cherry Cheesecake at position 28, I'm going to have to give that a go.

I do quite a bit of baking and enjoy it but am bad at standing back and letting the kids have a go. I might try some of the easier ones with them too.

[dotcomlovenest]

I have recently stepped out of my comfort with baking and am now at it all the time.
For my daughters 13th birthday she wanted a carrot cake that looked like cheese with a mouse on top.
The hard bit was making the mouse brown as brown food dye is hard to come by.
A friend suggested I use coco powder and butter mixed in with the sugar paste. It worked a treat.

[4yoniD]

Some of the recipes were odd ingredients rather that difficult, but I quite fancy trying the Grandmothers Cocoa Cake. Disappointed that there was no rainbow cake - I made one for DD1s birthday and it was fantastically impressive, if I say so myself

Last week I baked some lovely muffins (apple sauce and cinnamon) - the first time I have ever succeeded with muffins! Goodness knows why these worked and the others were crap

[Gracelo]

I bake loads. Cakes, biscuits, bread, buns, sweet and savory stuff, anything really. I learned how to bake from a very young age from my mum who is a fabulous baker and bit of a baking legend back home. I'm not keen on decorating cakes but I make personalized birthday cakes for the dc.

There are some great recipes on the Stork page. I might try the peanut butter and chocolate cake (level 78). I don't much like chocolate but I loooove anything with peanut butter.

Right now, everything rhubarby is a favourite at home, mostly my rhubarb meringue cake.

[ArcticRoll]

I love the sound of chocolate brownie meringue cake and will attempt to bake it for my daughter's birthday.
I bake quite a lot, my favourite thing to bake is a pavlova and find it so much easier now that I have a Kitchen Aid as can turn the mixer on and leave it to whisk whilst I prepare the tin etc.
I must admit that was quite snooty about Stork but now much prefer it in buttercream icing than butter-less claggy.
My tips for getting kids involved is to let them get on it rather than hovering and worrying about the mess.

[moonbells]

I'd like to try the level 41 Eszterhazy cake. I loathe nuts (or rather they make me ill) so the cake is totally non-tempting and great for my diet. My nut and cream-loving carnivore husband, who is forever complaining he hates most cakes because they have too much sponge and not enough cream, will adore it!

Stork was the staple where I was brought up. The Stork Cookery Service cookbook (The Art of Home Cooking) of the early 60s contains most of the food I had as a child, it was mum's standard. Many years later (after trying unsuccessfully to 'borrow' the now-threadbare book off her) I found a pristine copy in a secondhand shop. Much delight! It has the best fruitcake recipe in. Used for my wedding cake, and many other special occasions. I learned formal icing for that!

DS loves cupcakes and so we often bake them together: he'll put the cases into the muffin tray, help me crack eggs and watch while I whizz the mixture. After it's all done, he'll help me decorate the cakes. I have to watch though, or all the jelly diamonds magically vanish...

[Clawdy]

My mum's fruit cake was lovely and so simple - half a block of Stork,and the same weight in flour,sugar,dried fruit and eggs. She always melted the marge in a pan with the fruit, then stirred in the other ingredients. Made it so easy to mix.