The record-breaking cake was commissioned by home-swapping platform, Love Home Swap as part of their 10th birthday celebrations – and to recognise their global travel community’s optimism and collaboration during the pandemic.

The showstopper cake was created this week by Great British Bake Off winner 2018, Rahul Mandal. He said: “As far as baking challenges go, this one was epic and the hardest bake I’ve ever done, but I knew straight away I had to take it on. Like many others I’ve missed going on holiday recently and I appreciate more than ever before how travel – taking a leap, exploring a new place, meeting new people and seeing how others live – is so good for the soul.

“When I was asked to take this particular leap, I didn’t have to think twice. The hardest part wasn’t in fact making the cake, it was devising the recipe and ensuring the flavour balance was just right. I wanted to capture the essence of all these wonderful countries and celebrate them in the way only a cake can do.”

Each ingredient of this immensely complex project represents one of the 100 countries that Love Home Swap has homes in. Ingredients include peaches from Paraguay, tea from Taiwan and cinnamon from the Seychelles.

The average cake tends to have around five to 10 ingredients, which most people will be familiar with – eggs, butter, sugar, flour and some kind of flavouring such as cocoa powder or vanilla extract. However, the shopping list for this cake reads like a vivid travel journal, taking travel-lovers through bustling spice markets, fascinating natural wonders, and into the heart of communities and kitchens around the world.

It’s designed to inspire as well as transport cake-lovers to their favourite holiday destinations, with highlights including a number of exotic ingredients alongside some more standard ones like eggs from the United Kingdom and chocolate from Belgium. Within the cake are sesame seeds from Cyprus, lingonberry jam from Finland, lychees from Hong Kong, meadowsweet from Kazakhstan, tonka beans from Nigeria, cinnamon from the Seychelles, hibiscus from Singapore, oolong tea from Taiwan and so the list goes on from the A-Z of countries ending with cane sugar from Zambia.

The stunning creation, which weighs in at over a whopping 50 kilograms and measures over a metre in height, features star-baker and engineer researcher Rahul Mandal’s signature creativity and innovation – with five layers depicting a stack of suitcases topped with a globe, all of which have been hand-decorated using fondant icing. The cake layers include the following flavours: chocolate and cherry, mixed fruit and nut, spiced citrus and berry, tropical sponge with tropical jam and white chocolate, passionfruit and peach.

Célia Pronto, managing director of Love Home Swap commented: “Love Home Swap hit a few big milestones in 2021: we turned 10 and we wanted to celebrate the 100 countries on our platform with a celebration cake. So what better way to do that, than by honouring these 100 countries using an ingredient from each one? But this cake is about more than our milestones; we’ve been inspired by the way our global travel community has remained optimistic and pulled together to get through the last 18 months, so this celebration is dedicated to all of them.

“The tourism industry is recovering, but we all know the current situation is only just scratching the surface of people’s desire to travel and reconnect. We hope this cake inspires us all to keep dreaming and planning for future adventures.”

The recipe and step-by-step instructions are available at http://lovehomeswap.com/100ingredientcake for anyone brave enough to take on the challenge and recreate this masterpiece at home. Rahul’s main piece of advice? “It’s a big challenge but approach it like you would any other travel adventure; try to relax and enjoy every stage.”

Rahul also provided his top five tips for anyone tackling a show-stopping celebration bake:

1. Whether your cake includes 100 ingredients or just five, if you’re an amateur baker, always follow the recipe – they are tried-and-tested, so don’t go rogue!
2. Always measure the ingredients out properly and mix them together well. Baking is more science than art.
3. Don’t use too much raising agent as your cake will end up rising too quickly in the oven and then fall flat in the middle.
4. Make sure you know your oven well. Each oven will likely have hot spots which can ruin the bake if you’re not careful with monitoring the heat.
5. Always be patient. If something doesn’t work, think about what you could do differently and try it again – you’ll get there!

Anyone up for the challenge of recreating the cake can find the recipe at http://lovehomeswap.com/100ingredientcake