Some cakes return to the festive table every year because they carry a story, a flavour people trust, or both. This guide covers ten of them. Each section gives the history first, then a tested recipe a beginner can finish in one afternoon. Where the origin of a cake is disputed, I say so rather than pick a side. Oven temperatures are in Celsius with Fahrenheit in brackets.

Before You Start



Most failed cakes come from three mistakes. The first is a wrong oven temperature, because home ovens often run hotter or cooler than the dial shows, so an inexpensive oven thermometer is worth buying. The second is scooping flour straight from the bag, which packs it down and can add up to 30 percent extra. Weigh it or spoon it lightly into the cup. 

The third is opening the oven door before the cake has set, which makes the middle sink. Use butter and eggs at room temperature unless told otherwise, and test doneness with a skewer that should come out clean or with a few dry crumbs. Cakes with cream, mascarpone or cream cheese must stay refrigerated and should not sit out for more than two hours.

1. Chocolate Gateau



Gateau is simply the French word for cake. In Britain, the chocolate gateau became a restaurant favourite in the 1970s, when dessert trolleys carried tall, cream covered cakes to the table and gave diners a sense of occasion. The cake stayed popular because dark chocolate, cream and a dense crumb suit almost every palate, and because it needs no special skill.

Melt 200g dark chocolate with 150g butter and let it cool for ten minutes. Whisk 4 eggs with 150g sugar until pale and thick, then fold in the chocolate mixture. Sift in 60g plain flour and 20g cocoa powder and fold gently. 

Pour the batter into a greased and lined 20cm tin and bake at 180C (350F) for 28 to 30 minutes. The centre should be just set and slightly soft. Cool completely, then cover with whipped cream or a ganache made from equal weights of chocolate and warm cream. The cake keeps for three days in the fridge.

2. Ferrero Rocher Cake



The cake follows the chocolate. Ferrero Rocher was launched by the Italian company Ferrero in 1982, and the name refers to a rock grotto at Lourdes. The flavour behind it is much older. Hazelnuts and chocolate have been paired in Piedmont, Italy, for two centuries. 

A cocoa shortage during the Napoleonic era pushed chocolatiers to stretch their supply with ground hazelnuts, which created gianduja. Ferrero later built Nutella on the same idea in 1964. The cake has no single inventor. Bakeries and home bakers began making it because the combination is so well recognised.



This recipe gives you the chocolate sponge that is reused in recipes 3 and 8. Whisk 200g flour, 50g cocoa, 200g sugar, 1 teaspoon baking powder, half a teaspoon baking soda and a pinch of salt. In another bowl, mix 2 eggs, 200ml milk, 100ml oil and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Combine both mixtures until smooth, divide between two greased 18cm tins and bake at 175°C (350°F) for 25 to 30 minutes. For the filling, heat 200ml cream and pour it over 200g chopped dark chocolate. 

Stir until glossy. Once it has cooled and thickened, mix in 4 tablespoons of hazelnut chocolate spread. Sandwich and cover the cake with this ganache, press chopped roasted hazelnuts on the sides, and top with a ring of Ferrero Rocher chocolates.

3. Black Forest Cake



The German name is Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte, and it comes from the Black Forest region in south western Germany, which is known for sour cherries and the cherry brandy called kirsch. The earliest written recipes appear in the 1930s. Several confectioners claim to have invented it, so the exact creator is not settled. 

In Germany, a cake sold under the traditional name is expected to contain kirsch, which tells you how closely the cake is tied to its region. It became famous worldwide in the 1970s and 1980s, and it remains a standard birthday cake in many countries, including India.

Bake the sponge from recipe 2. Pit about 300g of cherries, canned or fresh. Keep the syrup from canned cherries, or simmer fresh ones with 3 tablespoons of sugar and a little water. Cut each sponge in half horizontally to make four layers.

 Brush each layer with cherry syrup, and add a tablespoon of kirsch if you want the traditional flavour. Whip 400ml cold cream with 2 tablespoons of icing sugar until it holds soft peaks. 

Spread cream and cherries between the layers, then cover the outside with cream. Press dark chocolate shavings on top and finish with a few whole cherries. Chill for at least two hours so the layers hold when sliced.

4. Baileys Tiramisu Cake



Tiramisu comes from the Veneto region of Italy and dates to the 1960s or 1970s. The restaurant Le Beccherie in Treviso is often credited, while the Friuli region makes its own claim. The name means "pick me up" in Italian, a reference to the coffee and sugar. It is young compared with most Italian desserts, yet it spread across the world within a few decades. 

Baileys Irish Cream was introduced in 1974, and bakers soon began using it in place of the traditional marsala or rum, since it adds cream and chocolate notes without extra work.

This version needs no oven. Whip 250g mascarpone with 250ml cold cream and 3 tablespoons of sugar until thick, then stir in 60ml Baileys. 

Mix 200 ml of cooled strong coffee with 2 tablespoons of Baileys. Dip about 24 ladyfinger biscuits quickly into the coffee, because longer soaking makes them collapse. Line a loose base 20 cm in tin with a layer of biscuits, spread half the cream, add a second layer of biscuits, and finish with the remaining cream. 

Refrigerate for at least six hours or overnight and dust with cocoa powder just before serving. The recipe has no raw eggs, but it does contain alcohol, so consider guests who avoid it.

5. Red Velvet Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting



Red velvet is an American Southern cake. Its colour was once partly natural, since cocoa reacts with buttermilk and vinegar to give a reddish tint. 

During the Great Depression, food colouring companies promoted the cake with bottled red dye, and that fixed the bright colour we know today. A story links it to the Waldorf Astoria hotel in New York, but that claim is not proven.

 Cream cheese frosting became the standard pairing because its tang balances the mild cocoa flavour. The film Steel Magnolias, released in 1989, made the cake famous again with its red velvet groom's cake.



Sift 250 g flour, 200 g sugar, 2 tablespoons cocoa, 1 teaspoon baking soda and half a teaspoon salt. Whisk 240 ml buttermilk, 120 ml oil, 2 eggs, 1 teaspoon vanilla, 1 teaspoon white vinegar and 1 tablespoon red gel food color. 

Combine the two mixtures gently, divide between two 20 cm tins, and bake at 175°C (350°F) for 25 to 28 minutes. If you have no buttermilk, stir one tablespoon of lemon juice into 240 ml of milk and rest it for ten minutes.

 For the frosting, beat 115g soft butter with 225g cold cream cheese, then add 300 g sifted icing sugar. Use full fat cream cheese from a block, because the tub type is too soft and makes a runny frosting.

6. Eggless Banana Bread



Banana bread rose to popularity in the United States in the 1930s. Baking soda and baking powder had become common in home kitchens, and bananas had become cheap and widely available.

 Home cooks needed a way to use overripe fruit during hard economic times, and the loaf solved that problem. 

Eggless versions are popular today because they suit vegetarian households and people with egg allergies, and because the bananas and yoghurt provide enough moisture and binding on their own.



Mash 3 ripe bananas, about 300 g, until almost smooth. Stir in 100g brown sugar, 80 ml oil, 60g plain yogurt, 60 ml milk, and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Add 200 g flour, 1 teaspoon baking soda, half a teaspoon baking powder, half a teaspoon cinnamon, and a pinch of salt. 

Mix only until the flour disappears, because overmixing makes the loaf tough. Fold in 60g chopped walnuts. 

Bake in a lined 900g loaf tin at 175C (350F) for 45 to 50 minutes. The bananas must have black spots on the skin, since they supply the sweetness and moisture that eggs would otherwise help with.

7. Mango Cake

The mango has been grown in South Asia for thousands of years, and it holds a central place in Indian food and culture.

 The Alphonso variety from Maharashtra is named after Afonso de Albuquerque, the Portuguese commander who is linked to its early cultivation. Baking in India also has a festive history of its own. A Christmas cake was sold at the Mambally bakery in Thalassery, Kerala, in 1883, and that bakery is often cited as the start of the Indian bakery tradition. 

Mango cake is a modern home bake with no single inventor, and it is popular because it brings a familiar fruit into a Western style celebration cake.

Fresh mangoes are out of season in the festive months, so use canned Alphonso or Kesar pulp, which is widely sold and consistent. Whisk 2 eggs with 150g sugar and 100ml oil, then add 250g mango pulp and 1 teaspoon vanilla. 

Sift in 200g flour, 1 teaspoon baking powder and half a teaspoon baking soda. Fold gently and pour into a 20cm tin. Bake at 175C (350F) for 35 minutes. Cool and top with whipped cream and a thin layer of mango pulp mixed with a spoonful of sugar. The cake is moist and slightly dense, so it slices cleanly once chilled.

8. KitKat Cake



The KitKat began as Rowntree's Chocolate Crisp in 1935 in York, England, and received its current name in 1937. Nestle bought Rowntree in 1988, and the wafer fingers are now sold in over 100 countries. 

The cake built around them has no documented inventor. It became a birthday favourite because the fingers act as a ready made decoration, so a baker with no piping skill can produce a striking cake.



Bake the chocolate sponge from recipe 2 in a single 20cm tin, using the same batter amounts, and extend the bake to 35 minutes. Cool it fully. Prepare a ganache from 200g chocolate and 200ml warm cream and let it thicken until spreadable.

 Cover the top and sides of the cake. Press KitKat fingers gently against the sides, using two to three packs depending on the size of your cake.

 Tie a ribbon around the outside to hold them in place. Fill the top with small chocolate candies, berries or chopped KitKat.

9. Berry Chantilly Cake



Chantilly cream is sweetened whipped cream, named after the Chateau de Chantilly in France. A popular legend ties it to the seventeenth century chef Francois Vatel, but historians have not confirmed this. 

The cake in this section is linked to the bakery counters of the American grocery chain Whole Foods Market, where a berry and mascarpone cream cake became a best seller. I do not know that store's formula, so the recipe below is an original home version. 

Its fame comes from its contrast: a light sponge, a cool cream and fresh fruit that suits festive tables after heavy meals.Cream 115g soft butter with 200g sugar, then beat in 3 eggs one at a time and add 1 teaspoon vanilla. Alternate 250g flour mixed with 2 teaspoons baking powder and 180ml milk. 

Bake in two 20cm tins at 175C (350F) for 22 to 25 minutes. For the cream, whip 250g mascarpone with 300ml cold cream, 60g icing sugar and 1 teaspoon vanilla until it holds soft peaks. 

Layer the cooled sponges with cream and 300g mixed berries, then cover the cake with cream and add more berries on top. Serve it the same day for the best texture.

10. Easy Sacher Torte



The Sacher torte is one of the few cakes with a documented creator. Franz Sacher, then a 16 year old apprentice, made it in Vienna in 1832 for Prince Metternich, who needed a dessert when the head chef was ill. 

His son Eduard later opened the Hotel Sacher in 1876, and the cake became its signature. A long legal fight followed between the hotel and the Viennese pastry house Demel over who could use the name "original".

 It was settled in 1963, and the hotel now sells the "Original Sacher-Torte". The hotel keeps its exact recipe private, so this is a simplified home version.



Melt 150g dark chocolate with 125g butter and cool slightly. Beat 6 egg yolks with 50g sugar, then stir in the chocolate. Whisk the 6 egg whites with 50g sugar to stiff peaks. 

Fold a third of the whites into the chocolate mixture, then fold in 125g sifted flour, then the rest of the whites. Bake in a greased 20cm tin at 170C (340F) for 40 to 45 minutes. When cool, slice into two layers and spread warmed apricot jam between them and over the top.

 Make a glaze from 150g chocolate and 150ml cream, pour it over the cake and let it set. Serve with unsweetened whipped cream to balance the sweetness.

Storage and Make Ahead Tips

Sponges can be baked up to two days ahead, wrapped tightly in cling film and kept in the fridge. Ganache can be made a day early and warmed gently before use. 

Cakes with whipped cream, mascarpone or cream cheese should be assembled on the day of serving or the evening before, and they must stay refrigerated. Banana bread and the Sacher torte keep for several days at room temperature when wrapped well.

Final Words

These ten cakes cover chocolate, fruit, coffee and cream, so you can build a festive table without repeating a flavour. Start with banana bread or the chocolate gateau if you are new to baking, then move to the layered cakes once you trust your oven. Test with a skewer, follow the weights given, and keep dairy based cakes chilled.