If you haven’t watched hit chef drama The Bear, imagine the most stressful situation you possibly can, in which everyone you hate and love is shouting over one another, refusing to listen and absolutely anything could combust in an instant.
“It very much represents what I trained to do,” says food writer Jane Dunn with a laugh. The 32-year-old studied at Ashburton Chefs Academy in Devon, but became a baking blogger when she realised high-pressure kitchens weren’t actually her Mecca. “Very quickly, I went, ‘I don’t think I can do this.’”
The Bear, she says, is “very accurate – the pressure people feel because food is love and life and a lot of care goes into it”. She is much happier watching it than living it, and instead, Dunn, who grew up in Portsmouth, has spun her own incredibly successful corner of the food world into being – out of sugar, chocolate orange (her favourite flavour) and a wholesome, inspiring approach to baking, through her blog, Jane’s Patisserie.
Ten years into blogging, with around 2.2 million followers across her social platforms (“Which is eeek,” she says, wordless. “The fact this is my job still baffles me,”), she’s sold half a million cookbooks.
And while she’s not in The Bear’s frenetic cheffing world, she has had her own rather major TV milestone recently. Dunn appeared on Saturday Kitchen for the first time, baking scones to feed host Matt Tebbutt. “It’s something I’d grown up watching, so that was very surreal to be on the other side of the camera,” says Dunn. “I was stood in the studio going, ‘What is my life right now? I’m filming Saturday Kitchen. This is BBC One on a Saturday. This is insane.’” What helped was having faith that her scones would be delicious. Once it was done, “I was like, ‘I want to do it again, straight away.’”
Dunn’s latest recipe collection – which features her cheese, bacon and leek scones – is Jane’s Patisserie: Classic. Packed with “core baking and delicious treats”, there’s retro recipes such as black forest gateau that have leapt straight out of childhood memories from the Eighties and Nineties, homemade versions of supermarket staples, like checkerboard Battenberg cake and Jammy Dodgers, alongside some very on-brand “Jane’s Patisserie” crazy baking mashups, including a brownie tart, cinnamon roll blondies and cookienuts (cookie doughnuts).
“Doing the fun, fancy new things are very me,” she says, explaining that the most challenging moments in her line of work are when she’s trying to nail down core recipes, like apple pie, fish pie and English muffins. “It’s those ones I feel more pressure on getting right, because they are so notorious,” she says. “I naturally feel more comfortable with the Jane’s Patisserie style twists, because I’m like, ‘This is fine. Just shove these together. Let’s have fun.’”
There are purists who struggle with her concoctions… “[They can be] a little bit like, ‘Hang on, you’re merging what with what?’ And get a little bit upset. But as long as I’m not damaging the reputation of an original idea, then it’s just a fun thing, and all good.”
Her other challenge, this summer especially, is baking when it’s 30C outside. “It’s horrible,” she says grinning, noting that her oven goes on at 7am and then she gets out of the kitchen as quickly as possible, or resorts to no-bake bakes, like her no-bake white chocolate and ginger cheesecake.
Cookies are Dunn’s favourite bake to make, carrot cake is her favourite to eat, and she finds sweet peanut butter bakes the least tempting (“I have too much of an affinity for satay,”) but she’s always experimenting with flavours. The flavours of tiramisu are receiving a lot of love at the moment, popping up in a layer cake and truffles. “If I’m at a restaurant, typically there’s either tiramisu or sticky toffee pudding [on the menu]. If there’s both, I will order both, because I want to find out which one’s the better one,” she says solemnly.
Dunn is very much of the belief that sugar is not the enemy, and we all deserve something sweet every now and again – double puddings included. “Everything I do is about balance. I think you can have cake and dessert as part of a nice diet and treat yourself. And food is food. Food is fuel. It’s good for the soul,” she says.
Interestingly, the rise in people’s concerns around ultra-processed foods has nudged many towards her recipes. “People are appreciating homemade food a lot more than shop-bought or processed,” says Dunn. “It’s opening up the minds of people to go, ‘Oh, actually, we can still have cake. How about we make it ourselves?’ We know what’s in it. It’s cheaper, and it’s worth doing.”
There’s an element of processing to almost all ingredients, whether it’s butter or sugar, “but knowing that it is just sugar, compared to a Victoria sponge on the supermarket shelf with 50 ingredients in it,” is different, she adds, “if you make it at home, it’s four or five.”
Dunn is very aware that the cost of ingredients and switching the oven on can put people off baking from scratch, but sees the act of baking as a treat in itself and “quite an indulgent” activity. “I can just take a minute and relax, and you get something delicious at the end. I love baking, because then when I feed everyone with all of my cakes, they also get happy. It’s a treat for everyone.”
The washing up, not so much though: “I don’t think I could live without a dishwasher. I’m not gonna lie.”
‘Jane’s Patisserie: Classic’ by Jane Dunn (Ebury Press, £25).
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