Hi April— the intarsia is definitely tricky!

For the colourwork section, you switch from knitting in the round to knitting back and forth, with the ‘start’ of each row moving along the curve of the bear’s head as you knit it (so you’re right that you don’t technically finish Row 1!). The yarn over at the start of Row 2 is worked to create a join (you purl it together with a true stitch at the end of the row to connect the two sides of the fabric, keeping your work ‘in the round’ despite the fact that you’re essentially knitting flat). The slip stitches at the end of Row 1 are worked to help form the shape of the bear’s head. You’re knitting top-down, so the bear’s head increases in size each row. You slip the stitches so that the contrast yarn is in the right place for the next round: 2 stitches further out than the line of colour from the row below. You don’t knit them, because you’d be using the wrong colour yarn, which would throw off the design. In short, the yarn over is a fundamental requirement of the intarsia-in-the-round technique, but the slipped stitches are a practical requirement of this particular colourwork design.

So yes, you don’t finish the first row, you turn your work so that the wrong side is facing you, then work the yarn over as the start of Row 2.

Honestly, this is a super complicated technique, but it does work really well. What got me through it was to just knit exactly what the pattern says and try not to overthink the how/why of it all! It’s very much a case of knit-what-you-see and trust that it will all work out (and it will!). I hope that helps?

Hi Carlotta, that’s so exciting! Huge congratulations to your son and his fiancée (who has excellent taste in cake flavours- I’m a big chocolate cake fan too!). I think your best bet for a 3 tier cake would be 8″, 6″ and 4″ tiers. You will probably have some leftovers, but I always think that’s preferable to not having enough (and the icing gets quite fiddly once you start going down to diameters smaller than 4″!). If you’d prefer not to have too much leftover cake, you could always make each tier with 2 layers of cake (as opposed to the 3 layers I’ve done here). For reference, a 3-layer version of an 8″/6″/4″ cake will yield approx. 50-60 portions, while a 2-layer version of the same cake will yield approx. 30-40 portions. I hope that helps!

Hi Sharon, how exciting! Congratulations to your son. For a 3 layer, 9 inch cake, I’d scale the recipe down to use 7 eggs (the layers will be ever so slightly thinner than the original recipe, but I think that’s preferable to them overflowing!). If you multiply each of the ingredient quantities listed for the 10 inch cake by 7/9 (0.777777…etc) you’ll get the right amounts! Hope this helps 🙂

Hi Janet, HUGE congratulations to your daughter (and happy birthday to her, in advance!). I’m so sorry that the chocolate tier has been causing you problems. The baked cake will have a few cracks (like in the photo in the tutorial: is your cracking much more dramatic than that?), but it’s usually just on the surface, so once you level the cake it’s absolutely fine.

However, excessive cracking is usually caused by too high an oven temperature. This cake is baked at a lower temperature than most, which could be the problem here? I have to admit, I’ve never used an Aga (I wish I had!), but I do think your cold shelf idea sounds like it should help! If that doesn’t work, you might be better off using one of the slightly cooler compartments of your Aga and baking the cake for a little longer? This cake really benefits from a low and slow cook— it’s super moist so it shouldn’t dry out.

I’d also recommend being really precise when you’re measuring the bicarb (too much raising agent can sometimes contribute to cracking too!). I probably would recommend using the Green & Black’s cocoa as opposed to the cacao, just in case the slightly different composition is having an effect on the batter? Otherwise, Kefir should be a fine substitution for the buttermilk (though I think it’s unlikely that the buttermilk is the culprit here).

I hope that’s helpful? My instinct is that the baking temperature is the issue, though I realise that’s not so easy to remedy in this case!

Hi Bethany! I haven’t tried using Stork in this recipe, but I probably wouldn’t recommend it (as much as I am usually a major proponent of Stork in cakes!). Stork usually makes for a lighter, fluffier cake, which doesn’t quite fit with the… fudgier (for lack of better word!) vibe of this recipe. If you did want to give it a go though, I’d definitely suggest using the block version (as opposed to the tub— I find the block behaves more like standard butter) and adding a pinch or two of salt to the batter!