Melanie Johnson - Bundt

EBURY

UK | USA | Canada | Ireland | Australia
New Zealand | India | South Africa

Ebury is part of the Penguin Random House group of companies whose addresses can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com .

This edition first published by Ebury Press in 2022

Bundt is the registered trademark of Northland Aluminum Products, Inc. Minneapolis MN

Text Melanie Johnson 2022
Photography Ebury Press 2022
Design Ebury Press 2022

Food Styling: Melanie Johnson & Bella Haycraft Mee
Food Styling Assistant: Jodie Nixon
Props Styling: Lauren Miller
Photographer: Nassima Rothacker
Image on : Lilybee Gwyn-Jones
Design: Louise Evans
Production: Rebecca Jones
Publishing Director: Elizabeth Bond

The moral right of the author has been asserted

Cover design: Louise Evans
Cover photography: Nassima Rothacker

ISBN: 978-1-529-19555-2

This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorized distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the authors and publishers rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

For me, baking is a constant pleasure. Its a mediative escape that feeds my curiosity and desire, all the while soothing my mind. My earliest memories are of my maternal grandmother, Elfriede, preparing a magical alchemists table in her beautiful orange grove in Australia. There were bowls piled high with mountains of sugar, cocoa powder, flour, eggs and butter melting from the scorching sun. She would leave me to experiment, free to create whatever chaos I wanted. My misshapen heap would be baked, declared a great success, and served on blue and white Meissen plates, alongside the perfectly formed, icing-sugar-dusted, chocolate and vanilla marbled Bundt my grandmother had effortlessly made.

Not so many years later, we lived in Austria, where my parents owned a fin de sicle hotel in a picturesque medieval village in the mountains. I have wonderful memories of my father, my hand held in his, as we went to visit the kitchens to watch the pastry chef prepare all the Viennese classics from Linzer torte to strudel on the vast marble tables. My mother, by contrast, was less of a foodie but generally extolled the virtues of quality, which meant that we were never short of the finest Sprungli chocolate truffles and had the most enviable kitchen garden with everything from raspberries to tayberries, marrows to beetroot, ensuring I was the queen of every school harvest festival.

The food stories flow, from my other grandmothers chocolate blancmange and my fathers souffl omelettes to my brothers perfect steak and my sisters mean schnitzel. Food was, and is, my familys language of love.

As a mother myself now, I wonder what memories will float to the surface for my daughter, Lilybee. I hope one of them will be the day we were making cupcakes and she ran away with a piping bag filled with pink cream cheese frosting. She was squeezing it into her little mouth as I chased her around the kitchen, giggling as only three-year-olds can, and in that one moment food, love, family and life were all perfectly woven together.

I like to think we all have a culinary history, unique to each of us, that encompasses a whole life of memories. So it is to my whole, wonderful, foodie family, with whom Ive made so many of mine, that I dedicate this book, my true celebration of Bundt love.

Love Melanie x

Whether it is for a celebration to be shared with family and friends or a simple slice with a cup of tea and a cozy chat, it is the comforting familiarity of making a cake that brings us all joy.

A Bundt is often baked to share or to gift. Many of us have a deep-rooted desire to nurture through food and our Bundt pans form the foundation of so many of these rituals worldwide.

Ever since Nordic Ware was founded as a humble kitchenware company in 1946, our focus has been to produce high-quality, innovative products designed to enrich peoples lives by adding style, convenience and an extra dash of fun to baking.

Our Bundt pans are undoubtedly our most popular product and the unique name Bundt was coined by our co-founder, Dave and Dotty Dalquist, to describe the fluted design of our unique ring cake pan. This original pan, inspired by the traditional German Gugelhupf, featured a distinctive hole in the center that allowed cakes to bake evenly and from our original Anniversary design, an icon was born.