Victoria Sponge Cake

This is the second of the two birthday cakes I made, a traditional Victoria Sponge cake. They key is to have a really light sponge so don't over mix, and a good quality jam (homemade is best).

Ingredients:

175g butter, softened

175g caster sugar

175g self-raising flour

½ tsp vanilla extract

 3 eggs

150ml double cream

4 tbsp strawberry or raspberry jam

Method

 Step 1

Pre-heat the oven to 180°C/gas 4.

To make this traditionally weigh your eggs (in their shells), and use the same weight for the butter, sugar and flour. Mine weighed about 175g.

 Step 2

Cream together the butter and sugar until light and creamy

 Step 3

Sift in the flour, vanilla and eggs and mix until combined. Split between two 20cm cake tins and put into the oven. 

Step 4 

Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until golden and the cakes spring back when lightly pressed. Carefully remove the cakes from the tins, you may need to run a round-bladed knife round the edge of the tin to help loosen. Place on a wire rack to cool completely.
Step 5

Put the first sponge upside down on a cake stand (this gives it a nice level surface to spread the filling, if it is uneven you can always slice a bit of cake off the top).

 Step 5

Whisk the cream until it is thick, and spread over the first cake.

 Step 6

Spoon the jam onto the cream and level out with a knife.

 Step 7

Place the second sponge on the top and press down lightly to sandwich them together.

 Step 8

Sift a little icing sugar over the top, I used a 'D' template to leave part of the cake without icing sugar on.

The two birthday cakes went down a treat!