Dear Mr Field I typed CCC into google and instead of the cricket that i was looking for i found www.clandestinecakeclub.co.uk There is a Pudsey & West Leeds branch . Would it be acceptable for my friend (a BDL) to become a member of such a club ? I have spoken to a member of said club , and they say they will teach my friend to bake yummy cakes if he was really interested in joining . First lesson would be a creamy Victoria Sandwich . Is that a sandwich or a cake ?

Dear Mr Field I typed CCC into google and instead of the cricket that i was looking for i found www.clandestinecakeclub.co.uk There is a Pudsey & West Leeds branch . Would it be acceptable for my friend (a BDL) to become a member of such a club ? I have spoken to a member of said club , and they say they will teach my friend to bake yummy cakes if he was really interested in joining . First lesson would be a creamy Victoria Sandwich . Is that a sandwich or a cake ?

I have heard of this mythical association, however I have also been assured by the relevant licensing authorities that it remains just that - a myth, the clue apparently being in the name, "clandestine".

It does however underline a far more important issue, the fact that we should be speaking of a cake club being "clandestine", the mere fact that cake-lovers should feel that they need to shroud their meetings under a cloak of secrecy is a disgrace in this modern age.

Cake lovers should unite and throw off this deep cloud of disgrace that has enveloped us in the years since aerobic exercise was made popular by thin scrawny cadavers who die in their thousands whilst running or cycling on stationary machines in gymnasiums - lettuce and a boiled egg does not make a meal, throw the lettuce back into the garden and use the egg to whisk up a cake mix, there is nothing more healthy than a cake made from natural products like wheat, eggs and milk and a dash of natural sugar, and chocolate, which is of course also a natural product, it being grown on trees and all.

Cake lovers of the world unite - ban salad, eliminate ridiculous exercise routines, laugh, nay scoff, in the face of those whippet like "personal fitness instructors" with a "Why the F*** would I want to look like you" - just eat cake, thats all.

You need to set up a charity or help group.

Cakewall

Some people eat cake, get over it.

Cake-Aid

We hire Wembley Stadium and everyone brings cake.

No music or anything, just cake.

Children In Need [size[iof cake[/i[/size

Terry Wogan hosts a charity-pledge-o-thon where soap stars perform song and dance from shiote stage shows and you have to ring in and pledge cake to make them stop, then you eat the cake and don't send it in.

Multi-Coloured-Cake-Shop

Noel Edmunds hosts a Saturday morning show dedicated to Battenburg cake where children phone-in and offer to swap unwanted christmas presents for a slice, with Maggie Philbin, but not Keith Chegwin.

...or a bloody great big sponsored [iCake[/iWalk.

You mean something like [sizerlhttp://www.charitygiving.co.uk/james2odsalrl[/size but with cake ?

Good thread this.

Mr McLaren Field Chicken sir, my Dad has recently wed, alls well and he's happy, but his new wife makes cakes/cupcakes etc and is wanting to make a business of it. How do I tell her that her cakes are quite dry and aren't the best?

Kind regards,

A too polite step-son

Mr Field,

I'm getting married in little over two weeks. Is this the right move?

There will be lots of cake...

Can she bake?

She can but doesn't bake often. I do live just 100 yards from Costello's though.

You should employ what we used to call "Our mothers seagull test".

You see when I wor nobbut a lad and still living at home with parents (as you do when you're nobbut a lad) our mother used to bake stuff in profuse quantities too numerous to count, particularly jam tarts and those jam tarts that have some sort of coconut lid on them, and sponge cake.

Sound an idyllic childhood other than the fact the our mother just was not a very good baker, if you could get to the jam tarts straight after they came out of the oven and risk removing the top of your mouth on the molten jam then you could just about force seven or eight of them down your throat, but leave them to cool and they became, how can I say this, well, a local building supplies company used to call regularly to collect the old jam tarts for paving use.

Her jam sponge cakes were of a similar ilk and virtually inedible and more often than not all of the products of her baking would end up being thrown on the back garden for the birds to eat.

Which is where the seagull test comes in.

The seagull test was simply a way of scientifically assessing just how heavy her baking products were by the length of time it took for a seagull to eat, digest and then expel the produce of its stomach labours in order for it to fly away again.

We regularly had seagulls marhing up and down our garden for one, sometimes two days trying to walk off the effects of over indulging on our mothers cakes, simply unable to take off and fly away until they had managed a big shiit and rid themselves of the superweight baking, it was quite sad to watch but very good for our air gun practice, rather like a live fairground shooting gallery.

I recommend you try the technique.

There comes a time in every lads life when he must simply face up to the realisation that life will, from this point forward, no longer be one long merry-go-round of lads, beer, and gaping at random womens s and/or busoooms.

Put simply, its not fair on the rest of us if you insist on remaining single.

I speak here as someone in their 4th year of married bliss, we've been married 30 years, but this is the 4th year etc etc.

Shortly after I married my dear wife she turned to me and said "When you proposed to me you said you were well off" to which I replied "I was, but I just didn't realise it..."

Yes folks I've been in my old dads gag book again under the chapter headed "weddings", I was married in Whitley Bay and for the last thirty years I've been consulting legal tomes in order to assess whether or not that is actually legal or not in the same way that if you get married in some strange foreign countries its not always legal in the UK, so far to no avail, its even been confirmed from the European Court of Human Rights that my wedding ceremony was "Probably OK" (their exact words).

So yes, this is the right move, you can't be happy for all of your life its just not fair, get thee wed and start your penury then come back when you've done thirty years like this old lag has and we'll compare notes.

PS - First thing to change, the TV remote control is no longer yours for controlling.