Manchester Central Library

My eldest daughter (like the other two) is a bit of a star. She is the archivist for the Royal Northern College of Music on Oxford Road, Manchester.

This only takes up 3 of her days though so,  a year or so ago, she set herself up as an independent archive and heritage consultant - offering professional archivist advice to organisations and companies who maybe didn't know where to start with their own archives or didn't have enough material to justify employing a full-time archivist.

Her 'spare' two days have proved to rarely be spare as she has worked with a number of organisations in Manchester including the Ahmed Iqbal Ullah Race Relations Resource Centre, Contact  Theatre and the Manchester Refugee Support Network.

This latter consultancy involved her working with the archives in Manchester central Library - very handy as it's just next to the tram stop at St Peter's Square.

She sent me a message last week of a coffee cake that is sold in the library cafe and commented that it was "lush".

Such a description needed to be investigated for veracity so, as I was in Manchester for a meeting, I took the opportunity to have elevenses with @herarchivist. She had texted me earlier in the day to say that she couldn't actually SEE any coffee cake but, gladly, by the time I arrived it had been put on the menu.

It was, to my shame, my first time at the library - a magnificent building in the centre (appropriately) of the city.

Recently re-opened after an extensive refurbishment, the library offers all sorts of services (including free wifi). Of course, my interest was in the cafe and, specifically, the coffee cake therein.

First impressions were favourable. It looked nice and dark (lots of coffee, hopefully) and the icing was nice and thick. In a number of places I've been to recently if you wanted decaf coffee you had to make do with instant. But not here - ethically sourced as well. Big thumbs up.

So, did the experience match the first impressions? Mostly, yes.

The sponge was delicious - moist and beautifully chewy. Not in a 'claggy' way but dense enough that it didn't disintegrate when I put my fork in. And definitely coffee flavoured.

The icing was a little bit of a let down. The 'filling' icing was more fondant than icing and the icing on the top, whilst nice and plentiful, was only a little bit more solid. But the taste? Oh the taste was sublime. And the icing contained the occasional shard of walnut, too - always a bonus.

and so to the scores:

Price: £2.95

Walnut Garnish: no
Walnut in sponge: yes
Sponge: 10/10
Icing: 8/10
Filling: yes - and plenty of it - but not really icing.

Birthday Cake

I made it to 55 last week. A venerable age and one which was recognised by my wife with a present of a banana milkshake. (She says I'm difficult to buy for but I can't remember how many subtle, and unsubtle, hints I have dropped over the years about wanting a Gibson SJ200 - natural finish, obviously, not sunburst).

I might have been disappointed were it not for the fact that my mum (obviously even a more venerable age than myself!) had made me a coffee cake.

It needs to be known that a coffee cake by Pauline Roberts is the baseline by which all other coffee cakes are judged. So, how would this stack up against the other entries in this blog?

Here we go...

The icing was perfect. And, by perfect, I mean slightly stale and crusty. A common mistake is for cakes to have fluffy fondant icing. This is wrong. The icing needs to be stiff and substantial. Almost chewy. The only point lost on the icing is for the fact that it didn't go right down the sides of the cake. A schoolgirl error but one which, as she is in her dotage, I am willing to forgive. Even though it was my birthday cake. The filling needs to be obvious, not just an afterthought. It is an integral part of the experience - check the photo for how the filling ought to be done.

The sponge was exactly as it ought to be. Slightly claggy, nice and moist, with no chance of it falling to bits on the plate or on the fork (or in your hands, for that matter, I'm not always patient enough to use a cake fork).

There were no walnuts. This does not matter. Mum has never put walnuts on, or in, the cake. It has never been described as a 'Coffee and Walnut Cake' therefore their absence is immaterial.

The crux of the matter is, of course, that there ought to be so much coffee in the cake that it needs to be eaten before lunch if you are intending to sleep at night. The coffee needs to be in the icing and the sponge, giving both a dark texture and a genuine coffee flavour. At this, as with everything else, my mother excels.

And so to the scores on the doors...

Price: Free of charge

Walnut Garnish: no
Walnut in sponge: no
Sponge: 10/10
Icing: 9/10
Filling: yes - and plenty of it.

Banburgh Castle

We'd been to Banburgh Castle a few years ago and, despite it not being a National Trust property (and would, therefore, cost us actual money to go in) we had enjoyed it enough to decide to go again.

Set in a spectacular position right on the North East coast, the castle has a long history of varied inhabitants seeing combat on a number of occasions and also being used as a school, a hospital - and a private dwelling.

The castle boasts a small cafe, with not a great number of tables and even though the day was grey, overcast, cold and with fairly frequent showers, it was a struggle to get a table. Being a gentleman, I sat down to claim territory while Sara went and got the grub. The age of chivalry is not dead...

And 'grub' included a coffee cake.

It was only a small piece - but the icing looked nice and thick, the sponge was moist and tightly packed and there were big chunks of walnut visible, although none on the top. It should have been delicious. In fairness, it wasn't that bad. It just lacked 'something' and I've no idea what that was. The icing wasn't as sturdy as it had looked - much more 'fondant' than good, chewy icing. Maybe that was what left me feeling slightly underwhelmed?

I'm also writing this having just had a piece of my Mum's coffee cake so have to accept that all memories of previous offerings are somewhat tarnished (more of that in another post).

Price: £2.75
Walnut Garnish: no
Walnut in sponge: yes - lots and lots of nice thick pieces
Sponge: 8/10
Icing: 8/10
Filling: yes - a decent amount.

Kielder Castle

A holiday was called for. We'd been working hard and fancied a few days away. So, not having spent a great deal of time in Northumberland, we thought we'd venture that way and just relax, making the best use we could of our National Trust memberships.

We stayed in a lovely farmhouse B+B (Tosson Tower Farm) just a couple of miles out of Rothbury.

Setting off early in the morning, we knew that we'd be too early to book into our accommodation so decided to check out Kielder Water and Forest Park en route to take up a couple of hours.

Walks, mountain bike hire - all the things you'd expect of a good country park - with a castle in the centre. Now, it's not really a castle - more of a hunting lodge with a few displays of old gamekeeping implements and some stuff about recycling and the stars (all to do with the world famous Kielder Observatory). And there was a cafe, and free wifi - what's not to like?

The coffee cake, that's what's not to like. The staff member who served us clearly would have rather been somewhere else and, as the cake crumbled as she put it on my plate she just picked up the bit that had fell off and sort of jammed it up against the bit that was left. Maybe she thought it would prove that it was rustic, artisinal and home made?

The sponge was dry and loose, the icing hardly there and looked as though it had been added as an afterthought. Maybe it had been. Mind you, it was only £2.20 so I suppose I should make allowances.

Still, the wifi was handy and, after our snack we headed out to navigate the longest forest drive in the UK (£4.50 toll).

Price: £2.20
Walnut Garnish: no
Walnut in sponge: yes
Sponge: 4/10
Icing: 3/10
Filling: yes - but only just.

The Lowry

Living in Salford, as I do, gives me access to not just the theatres and other venues in Manchester but also The Lowry Centre at Salford Quays.

With an art gallery, exhibition space, 2 main theatres and studio space, there's usually something going on of interest.

There's a lively programme of comedy running throughout the year and I was picking up tickets to see James Acaster, Ellie Taylor and Justin Moorhouse this autumn and, having spent a few quid on tickets, I decided a cup of coffee and a cake was in order at the cafe.

I was delighted to see that coffee cake was on the menu - and it looked promising so...

Well, it LOOKED promising but: the icing, whilst nice and thick in places, was mushy and too sweet - not much coffee there at all. The sponge was quite nice but, again, coffee coloured but not coffee flavoured. And the slice wasn't as big as I would have hoped for. 

Now, to be fair, I didn't go there for the coffee cake, I went there for the comedy so I shouldn't be too disappointed but I was - as it wasn't cheap!

Price: £3.25
Walnut Garnish: no
Walnut in sponge: no
Sponge: 7/10
Icing: 4/10
Filling: no

Calke Abbey

A Saturday with nothing to do... so a day out somewhere it would be.

I remembered, from my many trips to Swanwick in Derbyshire, passing a National Trust place which I had always meant to visit but never actually done so. I decided to have a look online and reckoned that the place I was thinking of was Calke Abbey.

Owned by the National Trust, this 'unstately home' as they call it has an interesting history. Its last owner was a single man - who only used three rooms. The rest were just locked up.

Now, I don't know if the NT took a conscious decision to leave things as they were as a statement or whether there just wasn't the money to do all the necessary work to restore the house to its former glory but the National Trust says it was the former so who am I to argue?

This means that the house is, well, a bit sad and sorry looking. Rooms that were clearly used as just a dumping ground for stuff that wasn't being used have been left exactly as they were found. Most of the rooms look tired and unkempt - which is the point, I suppose.

A few rooms have been maintained/restored (and structural work has been carried out to make the place safe) but there is an undeniable feeling of gloom and faded glory pervading the whole structure.

We entered through the courtyard and were a bit surprised to look in a stable and see a picture of, well, the same stable! Couldn't see the point of that to be honest...



It was only on moving away to look in the next unkempt outhouse that the reason for the picture, quite literally, revealed itself.



One up to the National Trust there. So much of what we see depends on our perspective!

Thankfully, one of the buildings which has had money lavished upon it is another stable block which now houses the cafe and obligatory shop. And, joy of joys, they sold Coffee and Walnut cake. Otherwise this post wouldn't exist.

It was a decent sized slice. There were plenty, and I mean, PLENTY of walnuts in the sponge and some flakes on the top icing.



So, you can see the picture - but what did it taste like?

Well, the sponge was delicious, the walnuts were plentiful but the icing? The icing was fluffy, insipid and, as you can see, rather thinly applied. It was tasty, but I can't help feeling that they missed a trick by not having a stronger coffee flavour to the icing (actually ANY coffee flavour in the icing) and more of it. Mind you, it was only £2.75 which I reckon is reasonable.

Oh, and I don't reckon this was the place I used to pass on the way to Swanwick after all... Oh well.

So, the not-at-all important rating:

Price: £2.75
Walnut Garnish: yes - flakes
Walnut in sponge: yes - lots
Sponge: 9/10
Icing: 3/10
Filling: yes - but only just.