Cakes, Cocktails & Charity
Putney Bake Club's 'Fairtrade' meeting combined all pleasures & making new friends
The food lovers alternative to a book club is the best description I can give for The Putney Bake Club. Who would have guessed so many great bakers lived in and around Putney - the back dining area of Moomba on Lacey Rd was a cake lovers heaven!
The Putney Bake Club is the result of the meeting of two like minded food bloggers (Stephanie & Sarah) who swapped baking tips on line. Realising they lived in adjoining postcodes, they met up and the rest is history!
The members are diverse in make up; from local students in Southfields, one mum of three who commutes in from Surrey as nothing similar is available locally and refreshingly and dare I say surprisingly two men! I met Chris (pictured above left) who had never baked before but after four trips to Putney High St to buy scales, ingredients and a cake tin he produced an amazing wheat free peanut cheesecake that would have looked at home at any jubilee street party last summer (pictured above right)!
This meeting was not a typical event - every meeting has a theme and today's was 'Fairtrade', - challenging all members to use Fairtrade ingredients. Emma combined ingredients and reproduced the Fairtrade logo with her red wine cake! But this time there were public speakers from Fairtrade and Oxfam, and Putney's MP Justine Greening Secretary of State for International Development, also joined the session. Your conscience was pricked as you were surrounded by such delights and hearing Nathalie Martin from Oxfam spoke about their IF campaign:
"One in eight people do not have enough to eat. All this can change IF the world's most powerful leaders get serious about tackling global hunger, tax dodging and land grabs. With David Cameron as the current G8 President, June 2013 is our big chance to save and change millions of lives."
Volunteer Jane Peyton, encouraged all members to shop Fairtrade as much as possible and with accessibility to Fairtrade products growing by the day this should prove easier. Stephanie told me that usually there would be a maximum of 30 members including any guests and each would introduce themselves and their creation. It was certainly a friendly environment where the cakes were the ice breaker and new friendships were forming throughout. The members get to taste everyone's cake and take home a lot more! Who'd have thought baking could be so popular - Mary Berry has a lot to answer for! |
 Nathalie Martin, Justine Greening MP, Stephanie Muzzall & Jane Peyton |
So if you love to bake and fancy meeting like minded people get in touch with the Putney Bake Club @
riversidebaking.com/putneybakeclub/. The next event is on 6.30pm June 4th with the theme 'Surprise Insides'.
* Fairtrade is a strategy for poverty alleviation and sustainable development. Its purpose is to create opportunities for producers and workers who have been economically disadvantaged or marginalized by the conventional trading system. If fair access to markets under better trade conditions would help them to overcome barriers to development, they can join Fairtrade.
May 30, 2013