CAKE must be near the top of the list of foodstuffs imbibed with meaning, symbolism and power. Arguably bread beats it to the top spot, but cake must be close.

My daughter and I recently went for ‘Afternoon Tea’ at Penarth’s ‘Waterloo Tea’, a treat from my friend Ben. Before deciding on which tea to drink, we were first asked to choose our cake. Such prominence was given to the delicious slabs eventually added to our tea stand, that they were the first decision to be made.

Whilst eating I thought about the importance of ‘Afternoon Tea’. No longer the preserve of the aristocracy; no longer a small something to keep one going between lunch and dinner, it is now an opportunity to meet friends, feel special, chatter and legitimately sit around gorging on cake and drinking your own body weight in tea. I say that with experience. At The Dorchester hotel in London, I once had a dilemma about what to do with a tea strainer over-spilling with tea leaves. In discussion with my sister about correct disposal etiquette, we concluded that there probably wasn’t one and that the etiquette was just not to quaff quite so much.

As a rule I prefer savoury, but cake eating has given me so many opportunities to take time out, sit, talk, share. My friend Amanda and I treat each other near our birthdays; my friend Alex and I have had some memorable moments over tea and cake; my daughter and I shared time without electronic gadgets or rushing around and just chatted and ate.

My Mum is an excellent baker, austere in that a recipe requiring six eggs will be cut down to half that many and yet still she produces light, fluffy results. Her (2 egg) chocolate, jam and cream or ginger cakes are the stuff of happy childhood memories. I remember my teddy bear birthday cake from when I was about five and how excited I was to be at my grandparents on a Friday, because that was cream cake day. My Nana’s coconut rock cakes are a lingering taste memory and the day my Nana died, I sat in a bakery and ate a cake, the place, the nourishment, it made her feel close.

I have two family birthdays soon and my thoughts are on the cake. It’s the ‘wow’ moment, the time the party assemble around their loved one to sing and cheer. At birthdays, weddings, christenings even funerals, cake is key. My friend Laura makes cakes, beautiful to look at and taste and I can’t help thinking how special it must be to produce something that brings so much pleasure, has so much tradition, and enables so much joy. The sociologist Zygmunt Bauman said, “You cannot have a cake and eat it too. Either you eat it, or you have it.” I take his point, but like to think there are at least moments, with friends and with family where you can, albeit fleetingly have both.