What would you typically buy at a bake sale?

30 comments

1. Pastries like Danishes and pasties. Also brownies.

2. brownies

3. Bakewell tart

4. Something savoury in a sea of shit over-iced cupcakes and brownies will be a welcome change.

5. Not something I’d expect to see but something that’s delicious: Tarte tatin!

6. Well made buttery shortbread

7. Cornflake cake, rice crispy cake, and Dennis the menace cup cakes

8. something that can freeze it, or at least keep for a few days. plus something nice that i wouldn’t make at home. i.e. fruit cake (Dundee), lemon bars, Bakewell tart, muffins, cookies, brownies, and /or something savoury such as cornish pasty or sausage rolls.

9. Flapjacks. Not too messy to eat and keep well. Plus I like the taste.

10. Banoffe pie is the best but no one seems to sell it

11. Lemon drizzle cake or a bun of some kind.

12. Brownies, jam tarts or a slice of carrot cake

13. Chocolate dipped marshmallow ‘top hats’, personally I can’t abide them but people love the nostalgia. I’d love a tray bake personally – chocolate tiffin with loads of cherries is at the top of my list.

    Also, most people check out nowadays and bring a tray of cupcakes from the local super market rather than baking which I always find kind of sad.

14. The core rule is that it must be shelf-stable at room temperature. I recall someone on reddit not too long ago wanting to create some kind of baked savoury casserole for a bake sale, and it predictably went down like a lead balloon.

    Beyond that, the rule tends to be to err n the side of sweet over savoury. Pizza slices, while technically baked, aren’t traditional for these things. Cakes, cookies, biscuits, and sweet pastries all work.

    I tend to be partial to pastries above all others. ymmv

15. Something I can transport home easily like cookies, shortbread or brownies

16. All bran cake goes over very well with the older crowd.

17. As it’s your first go, play safe and make something that always sells well; eg brownies [ but avoid nuts as so many are allergic] – or go savoury with cheese scones [easy to make.]

    Once you’ve seen what other people are making [and what people seem to want to buy] you can experiment a bit!

    What I’d like to see is a really good, gooey, dark ginger cake – very rarely do you see this at a bake sale.

18. Chocolate cake or brownies!

    Maybe bakewells.

19. You need to specify what kind of bake sale as they differ a lot.

    If it is for the school PTA they will probably be selling them cheap, you should make rice-crispie cakes as they have the highest margin. It hurts when they are sold for less than the cost of the ingredients. Do not go down the savoury route here if you want your kids to be able to show their faces next term!

    If it is for the WI, something you are confident that you do really well.

    Somewhere in between, make sure it looks good, is easy to serve, and won’t melt in the heat. You may want to pre-cut for ease of serving, but this can be tricky if your portion size differs from other people’s!

20. Something not too sweet ie carrot & ginger cake, banana bread

    It’ll be hot so maybe something summery like a lemon drizzle cake or little pavlovas

21. A really nice sausage roll

22. I’d love to see more interesting bakes and I’m more drawn to those than the standard stuff. Anything with interesting flavours and combinations or maybe it’s a bake from another country that I’ve not tried before.

    I’ve done a lot of bake sales and honestly my most popular items are the things that stand out. I also do a lot of premium cupcakes, for example miso banana caramel cupcakes with an oozy toffee sauce core or raspberry cupcakes with a lemon sherbet popping candy icing. I’ve had success with baklava too, easy to scale up and it’s something “different” but people have heard of it and know what it is.

23. Carrot cake everyday. I quite like dry carrot cake, so bake sale carrot cake is perfect. Maybe that says a lot about me.

24. I don’t want too much icing, and I don’t want to have to guess what flavour it is (eg I like toffee but not walnut, so those kind of golden beige cakes are a gamble).

    For bake sales I tend to try to make something that won’t be duplicated. For the church cake sale I made ginger cake (sticky and dark, like McVities Jamaican) and bara brith (delivered sliced and buttered). For the village jubilee get-together I did triple chocolate brownie, but that’s no use for fundraisers because the ingredients are more pricey.

    This week’s bakes will be apricot and white chocolate flapjack, and individual Bakewell tarts.

25. Victoria sponge cake, brownies, cup cakes, muffins scones….

26. Lemon drizzle cakes, scones, cupcakes/ fairy cakes are my go tos

27. Moussaka

28. A nice big pie, ideally steak and ale, and a big cake with cream and eat it all for one meal and feel proud.

29. All the lemon cake.

    Bonus if it’s seeded.

30. What I tend to make are things like Nigella’s clementine cake. It’s gluten free (ground almonds instead of flour) and great if you’ve got a lot of eggs to use up. Sticky but not gooey and keeps well in warm weather. Plus it’s a little bit different.