Research has revealed that Britain is in the thrall of a home baking bonanza, with 20 million consumers baking at home and a whopping £576m spent on baking ingredients last year. Over two thirds (69%) of Brits have bought baking ingredients in the last year and nearly four million Brits are baking at least once a month.

Baking is firmly a family activity, with two fifths of parents letting their children decide what is baked at home1. A new recycling generation also has an increased interest to ‘waste not, want not’ and rather than leave surplus fruit and vegetables to waste, healthy fruit preserves and banana cake recipes are filling baking cookbooks across the nation.

The increase in home baking could be put down to the recession, as many people are opting to bake their own bread rather than buy ready-made loaves from the supermarket to save money. Last year also saw a boom in home-baked cakes with cupcake consumption rising by more than half (52%).