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Finding the ultimate birthday cake

When we launched our birthday cake competition back in April we didn't know quite what to expect... sure, we all know how much you enjoy baking, but we were upping the stakes a bit with our brief - original recipes only, beautifully photographed and a bit of a wow factor...

But a month later the readers had responded in force and we had over 400 entries, and a lot of work, ahead of us. Now I love cakes (who doesn't?), and baking is really my 'thing', so although a big part of me was jumping at the chance to start delving through the entries, a small part of me was still having nightmares from a similar competition I judged for the Good Food channel... (sausage and strawberry jam cake, you know who you are). But I picked myself up and buried myself in the corner of the office for almost eight hours, sorting the good from the not so good, finding some interesting surprises along the way, and whittling the sack down to just under 80 contenders in all the categories.

As a passionate baker I was knocking up the sponges in my head, but others were in it purely for the looks

At this stage I had to call in the cavalry, so the rest of the food team joined me in the corner and helped scour my shortlist for the standout entries that would make it to the all-important Taste Test. This is where the disagreements began... As a passionate baker I was knocking up the sponges in my head, swayed by moist-looking sponges and good ratios of fat to flour, but others were in it purely for the looks, and for the modern thinkers amongst the team, innovative flavour combinations that might have put some traditionalists off. In the end a secret ballot was the only way to go - and I finally took the judging to the kitchen.

Five full days of intensive baking followed. I ate, slept and breathed cakes... only leaving the kitchen flour-smudged and sticky-fingered at around 5pm each day to call in the willing tasters. The standards were incredibly high: some were gorgeous but just missed the mark in the taste stakes, while others appeared mild-mannered on the outside but had hidden depths once delved into.

Occasionally love at first bite (seven-year-old Chloe Wilson's Blackberry & coconut squares), but more often than not we had to go back for seconds, thirds and fourths in order to make our minds up. In the case of the chocolate entries, a hard-waged battle ensued with the office taking sides between two favourites - only to be resolved weeks later with a second cook-off and a dramatic kitchen stand-off.

And then there were three...

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