Ten Poems about Baking

These ten poems celebrate all that’s wonderful about baking – the time-honoured recipes, the patient kneading and stirring of ingredients, the sticky fingers in the mixing bowl.

Baking, the poems seem to say again and again, is a profoundly human art: a homemade summer pudding can create “a stillness lost in taste” at a dinner party with friends, while an old spice jar can transport us swiftly back to childhood:

“I opened one: faint kitchen scents (a trace
of fruit breads, Welsh cakes, and the kitchen warm
and welcoming from school) took shadow form:
allspice and nutmeg, cinnamon and mace…”

from ‘Spice Jars’ by DA Prince

These are poems for anyone who loves to bake, as much as for those who simply appreciate the glory of a well-made Victoria Sponge.

Helena Nelson is a poet and publisher – and a dab hand at choux pastry.

Poems by Harry Clifton, CJ Dennis, Cathy Grindrod, Grevel Lindop, Gill McEvoy, Graham Mort, Helena Nelson, Kenn Nesbitt and DA Prince.

Cover illustration by Alice Pattullo.