A Half Baked Idea: Winner of the Fortnum & Mason's Debut Food Book Award

At the moment her mother died, Olivia Potts was baking a cake, badly. She wanted to impress the man she was dating, a cooking enthusiast who would later become her husband. So she tucked into the cake, completely unaware that, 275 miles away, her mother was dying. Afterwards, grief pushed Olivia into the kitchen. She came home from her job as a criminal barrister miserable and tired, and baked soda bread, pizza, and chocolate banana cake. Her cakes sank and her custard curdled. But she found comfort in jams and solace in pies, and what began as a distraction from grief became a way of building a life outside grief, making sense of her life without her mum. She left the bar and enrolled on the Diplôme de Pâtisserie at Le Cordon Bleu, plunging headfirst into the eccentric world of patisserie, with all its challenges, frustrations and culinary rewards - and a mind-boggling array of knives to boot.