If you love home baking and hard rock music, this new recipe book Bake in Black is for you. Featuring 58 recipes for cakes, biscuits, doughnuts, brownies and pies, each creation is a tribute to an iconic rock or metal band. Inspired by the sounds of bands such as Slayer, The Sex Pistols, ACDC, Aerosmith, Black Sabbath and Nirvana, each sweet treat is a unique bake designed to capture the essence of the music, with interesting flavour combinations and imaginative presentation. Every bake has been named after a track or album title, using some brilliant cake-related puns. How about Rainbow's "Since You've Been Scone" or Guns and Roses "Sweet Tooth O'Mine" or Meatloaf's "Battenburg Out Of Hell" to get you started? It's genius!!
Thankfully, not only is this book visually stunning, filled with humour, awesome rock band references and the coolest cake designs, it is also a great recipe book in its own right. The recipes are clear and concise, using easy to obtain ingredients and equipment. So you can reproduce these bakes and desserts at home. You can put your own spin on them and create your own versions of these amazing cakes and bakes.
I had a go at making one of the cakes, and although I needed to tweak it a little to adapt it to the pans I have at home, the essence is pure punk rock! I made the brilliantly titled "God Save the Cream", a homage to the Sex Pistols. The minted whipped cream worked wonderfully with the fresh strawberries and blueberries, covering the light sponge.
I am so inspired by this book that I am now trying to create an entire rock music themed dinner party for Ian's 47th birthday next week, complete with musical puns and awesome presentation. Maybe start with some Alice Soup-er served with Bread Zeppelin rolls followed by some Mexican food using Red Hot Chilli Peppers and with a "Megadeth by Chocolate" birthday cake for dessert. It's still a work in progress!
Bake in Black is available from musicroom.com for £14.99. It would make an excellent gift for anyone with a passion for rock music and home baking, especially when paired with the Electric Guitar Baking Spatula (which is £6.99). It's a brilliant addition to any bookshelf and has brought buns with puns into my repetoire. Whoever said baking wasn't rock 'n' roll!
Musicroom is the largest online retailer of sheet music, tutor methods, instructional DVDs, music software, instruments, accessories and gifts. It sells everything for the musician or music lover. We received the book to review.