When Allyson Gofton picks up my FaceTime call on a Friday morning, she's surrounded by boxes.
She and her family recently shifted from Auckland to Cambridge and, with equipment nagging to be unpacked, and a new, unfamiliar kitchen she describes as "form over function", she's very much not living the food-writer dream. The tins are not filled.
"My 16-year-old son headed off to French immersion camp today and I didn't see the notice asking for home-baking and a packed lunch until late last night.
"So first thing this morning, it was straight to Countdown to buy a banana cake and things for the lunchbox."
Gofton says she felt a flush of shame – a home-cooking queen packing her son off with a bought cake? But her son Jean-Luc wasn't fazed. "I'll just fit in with everyone else with this," he told his mum.
It makes sense Gofton would readily admit to buying cheap supermarket cake. She's no food snob.
Despite enjoying the trappings of a well-to-do life with children at private schools and the years the family spent living in France, Gofton has always been conscious that her brand sits firmly in the bosom of middle New Zealand.
"When you've been Allyson Gofton from Food in a Minute for 13 years," she says, "you don't start trying to be something too different."
So it is then that the recipes in her new book The Baker's Companion call for vanilla essence or extract, the cheap vanilla knock-off dismissed by many food writers in favour of the more expensive vanilla pod extractions.
Gofton's equally dismissive of the idea that organic eggs or a particular brand of sea salt will make for better baking.
"You might notice the difference if you're having an egg for breakfast, but when you're baking – not one bit!"
It's not that Gofton doesn't believe in quality over quantity, she's just realistic about what's achievable for most people.
"What I think is most important is that you eat healthfully and nourish yourself and your family," she says. "[And] that in our world we take consideration as to how well that food was raised or grown.
"Have a mindful presence," she says. "Do I need Zimbabwean snow peas? No you don't… but if you use frozen chopped onion to make a Bolognese, good for you. The important thing is you're making the Bolognese in the first place."
She doesn't begrudge meal kits because they encourage people to cook. In fact, she wishes Food in a Minute had gone down that path.
The Baker's Companion is the third iteration of Gofton's The Great Baking Book, which first came out 25 years ago.
Gofton has written her latest offering "not for my generation, but for parents and grandparents to give to their children and grandchildren". Many of the recipes are old favourites.
Basic questions from her 23-year-old assistant on the book made Gofton realise that basic cooking skills that were once assumed – how to beat an egg, say – needed to be explained more clearly these days.
If anyone is up for the job of helping the next generations to easily succeed in the kitchen, it's Gofton.
She cut her teeth in the test kitchen of New Zealand Woman's Weekly in its heyday.
"There were five cooks from different backgrounds – Cordon Bleu, army and so on."
As research, these workers chewed through cooking manuals and vast books with no photography that were written like technical guides. The Weekly cooks thoroughly understood the chemistry at work in the kitchen, especially in baking.
This sense of unfrilly integrity has stayed with Gofton. She wants to ensure that if you've bought butter – expensive as it now is – it won't be wasted on some vague recipe seemingly out to trip you up.
Some recipes call for fresh eggs, do they make a significant difference?
AG: Where the eggs are paramount to the ending, such as in a meringue or pav, then yes. As eggs age they get softer and are unable to hold the sugar, which can weep out the edges.
Softening butter - what's the best method for doing so? It's so annoying ending up with completely melted butter, but equally, it's so trying to beat in too-firm cubes!
AG: Firstly, don't use the butter spreads. They're blended with oil.
And don't try to melt butter as a big block. I chop butter into pieces and pop it in the microwave at 50 per cent for a brief time.
Or if you're creaming butter and sugar, you can put your sugar and diced butter in a bowl, then put it in oven for short time with the door open.
Many people think they can just start a recipe with melted butter, but melted butter acts as an oil and won't cream with sugar.
What's the most fool-proof way of melting chocolate?
AG: In a microwave. Don't cover it. I only ever use 50-70 per cent power. I half melt it, then leave to sit until the rest is melted. Don't overheat it. You can of course melt it in a bowl over a saucepan of water, but teaching people to not get steam into the bowl of chocolate can be tricky.
That ubiquitous pinch of salt - important?
AG: Where the ingredients are simple such as in a shortbread, yes, it does allow some flavour. And it's essential in yeast baking, but in other cases, no. And it certainly doesn't have to be flaky sea salt.
Sifting - need we bother?
AG: Sifting was done when bought flour might have come with some "friends" in it. But it does provide lightness. Packs of flour sit on a shelf and settle, sifting lightens it plus helps integrate raising agents in.
What implement is best when folding ingredients?
A holed metal spoon - it cuts through the mixture. A thick-edged wooden spoon won't cut through, it will just squash out the air bubbles you've laboriously created. And fold, don't overbeat.
As an apprentice, working in a maternity hospital, I learned to fold with my hands when making big batches of things – sponges, fruit cakes. I still do it, even if I'd probably get told off by the health and safety people. Make a sponge using your hands - just try it!
Why do cakes sometimes deflate after taking them out of the oven? Such a disappointment!
AG: Cakes primarily bake best at 180 degree Celsius. The first two-thirds or three-quarters of cooking time is really important. All the chemistry is happening then – the air is rising and proteins are setting. If you open the oven then, you interrupt that and it can fail to rise.
But if you don't do that, and the cake collapses when you take it out, there's been an inaccurate measurement somewhere in terms of the proteins to hold it together, or it could have been baked at too high a temperature.
Normally, you've done something in a hurry. The other day I made cake and thought I'd throw in some passionfruit; it came out like a pancake – too much acid!
Is it okay to leave a cake batter halfway through mixing, or before baking, to rush off and do something – or can this affect the end result?
AG: No. If you have to, do it before you add the eggs. Otherwise the air collapses and you can't re-beat in back in.
Given many of us are intent on decluttering, what types of tins do you consider must-haves?
– A baking tray is good for so many things
– A slice tin 20 x 30cm
– A muffin tin, standard size (they vary in size dramatically so beware).
– A 20cm – and if you can – a 23cm round tin too. Loose bottom or springform is best. Non-stick surfaces scratch and then things stick.
FEIJOA AND COCONUT CAKE from The Baker's Companion
For lovers of feijoas, this fresh fruit cake is heavenly. Other tropical fruits such as mango, pineapple or banana can be substituted.
MAKES: 22-24cm cake
PREP TIME: 20 minutes
COOK TIME: 1 hour
TIP: If wishing to use thread coconut, you will need the same amount by weight, about 180-200 grams.
Ingredients
150 grams butter, softened1½ cups caster sugar4 eggs, at room temperature, separated2 cups self-raising flour1 teaspoon baking powder2 cups desiccated coconut1 cup peeled and well-chopped fresh or bottled feijoas1 cup milk or coconut milk
Icing
Icing sugar to dustGrated rind of ½ lime or lemon
Method
Preheat the oven to 180 degree Celsius (160°C fan bake). Set the rack in the centre of the oven. Grease and line the base and sides of a 22–24cm round cake tin.
Beat the butter and sugar together until light and creamy. Add in the egg yolks, beating well until thick and creamy. Sift the flour and baking powder together and, using a metal spoon, fold into the creamed mixture with the coconut, feijoas and milk or coconut milk.
In a very clean bowl, whisk the egg whites until they form stiff peaks and, using the metal spoon, fold into the cake mixture. Turn into the prepared cake tin.
Bake in the preheated oven for 1 hour or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Stand in the tin for 10 minutes before turning out onto a cake rack to cool completely.
To serve, dust with icing sugar or cover with lime or lemon glacé icing and decorate with grated lime or lemon rind.
Variations
Spice the cake up with a little freshly grated ginger or a teaspoon of ground ginger, nutmeg, mace, cloves or cardamom, or add the grated rind of a lime or lemon.
GOOEY, RICH CHOC POTS from The Baker's Companion
MAKES: 6
PREP TIME: 15 minutes
COOK TIME: 10 minutes
Ingredients
100 grams butter, softened 1/3 cup well-packed soft brown sugar 5 eggs, at room temperature 6 tablespoons flour ½ teaspoon vanilla essence or extract Grated rind of 1 orange, optional 275 grams good-quality dark chocolate, melted and cooled 1 tablespoon orange liqueur Icing sugar to dust, optional
Method
Preheat the oven to 200 degrees Celsius (180°C fan bake). Set the rack in the centre of the oven. Lightly grease six three-quarter-cup capacity ovenproof ramekins and sit them on a baking tray.
Into a food processor, put the butter, brown sugar, eggs and flour, and process lightly to make a smooth batter. Add the vanilla essence or extract, and orange rind if using, followed by the cooled melted chocolate and orange liqueur, and pulse to mix well. Divide equally among the ramekins.
Bake in the preheated oven for 10 minutes, until the sides have begun to rise but the centres are still soft and sauce-like.
Serve immediately, dusted with icing sugar if wished.