Part work, Baked and Delicious magazine has been a big hit on Facebook with 14,000 people who “like” it, several thousand of whom declared their love before copies were on sale.
The first issue costs 99p, the second £2.99 and subsequent issues are £4.99. It claims to be “packed with international classics and traditional favourites” and that it “brings the very best of baking to today’s cooks.” As a further sweetener, each issue comes with a piece of colourful silicone bakeware. Subscribers also get “free” gifts such as electronic kitchen scales, cake tins, cake slices and the all important binder.
I’ve been amazed how many people have raved about this magazine in other blog reviews, to the point I’m wondering if they haven’t given it much thought or feel uncomfortable calling it a dud.
My Baked and Delicious Magazine REVIEW
We call spades spades here. My impression after reviewing issue one of Baked and Delicious was that it is:
- Flimsy at fewer than 30 pages per issue
- Cheap with pound shop quality bakeware gifts
- Overpriced for such a short magazine even bearing in mind the “free” gift
- Dated with 1980s yellow tinged photography
- Dreary with graphics that look like they were created in MS Word
- Unsophisticated with uninspiring food styling
- Badly edited with inconsistent layout and typos
On the plus side, the Gateaux St Honore recipe was the most useful but you’d do better to spend your cash on some generic baking books instead of doggedly committing to this week after week. For around £7.99 you can easily pick up little hardback baking books in the supermarket and discount book stores. You can add to your bakeware collection as necessary.
(For a highly informative post on the pros and cons of silicone bakeware, check out my friend Ozoz Kitchen Butterfly’s excellent post here)
Baked and Delicious has been out a while now but new subscribers get to buy back copies. Sixty issues are planned. If you want to back out, I’m informed you can cancel subscriptions at any time.
They emailed me asking me to review. Said no. Sounded crap. Obviously is. 🙂
Ha ha Mr P you put it so eloquently!!
Hooray! Well done, I am so pleased you have been ‘brave’ enough to present an honest opinion. After all the blog reviews I’ll be honest, I was miffed they hadn’t contacted me to review the product, after leaving a comment on another blog they did contact me and out of pure spite I refused to be sent a copy. Frankly publications should do their homework much better than this one seemed to … and as far as the silicone bakeware goes, form what I have seen at least, it seems cheap and flimsy and I doubt would help people new to baking to achieve great results first time round.
I’m not saying that silicone bakeware is all bad, hence my pointing everyone to Kitchen Butterfly’s excellent guide but the stuff with this magazine looked very shoddy.
Writing about something I didn’t like has been such fun. I must do it more often!
They sent me a copy, I said I didn’t like it, politely and didn’t review. However they kept bothering me to review it until I explained less politely why I said no thank you in the first place! You can get decent silicone wear cheaply and recipes free online if you can’t afford books, or go to the library! I got my cupcakes trays in Aldi for about £2 and they’re still going strong 3 years later!
Ha ha, I phoned them up and told them I thought it was rubbish! I haven’t rushed to get a review up but every time I saw it on my list I just got cross thinking about it and decided to give it to you folks all straight!!
I can’t understand why one would prefer to buy a magazine with recipes instead of a book to be honest.
And concerning this magazine in particular its first issue looked quite unprofessional – the layout, the pictures, the styling… Not mentioning the bakeware. I wouldn’t use it even if it is a gift. I don’t understand the silicone bake ware craze either, sorry, I prefer less plastic if possible.
Great you persist in your honest opinion on them!
The second I saw the cover I thought mmm this looks bit naff doesn’t it…
Saying this, I am and have been a subscriber to food magazines, but I still prefer books. At least they are straight to the point and not so much if any “empty” pages with ads 🙂
Admittedly this part work wouldn’t had ads… one of the few bonus things about it…!
I’m very pleased to see that my instinct to refuse to review this product was correct! I pretty much refused on principle due to a hatred of marketing that tricks people into parting with a *lot* of cash gradually. It would be much better, as you say, to buy a couple of decent baking books and the necessary tins to get yourself started than end up with flimsy magazines and flimsy silicone bakeware.
Although having looked at the initial email, I wasn’t offered a copy for review, merely asked to promote it on my blog, erm…. no! I replied saying so and subsequently ignored their response…..
Yeah, they were hesistant to send me one too, they were asking people to promote it without them having seen it hence my pestering for an actual copy of it. Imagine if I’d just said to my readers “oh blah di blah there’s a lovely new magazine out about baking”?!