I pin cakes on Pinterest all the time, I love to bake although I like homemade, slightly unperfect cakes...cakes made with love rather than precision :)
I've made (and bought) wonderfully creative cakes for my children over the years and so I thought this year for my own birthday that I would make my cake....why not?
(winner of the first series of The Great British Bake Off)
Some things to point out....
1. Definitely use gel colouring rather than normal food colouring - the colour is much stronger & you will only need a tiny amount.
I used normal food colouring last time & I got pastel colours - lovely but not what I was aiming for.
2. The recipe in the book has a white chocolate frosting/filling - this went wrong for me not once, but twice! In the end I made my own version of butter icing which I also coloured.
3. My sponges were not perfectly flat (due to a leaky cake tin incident) but icing covers a multitude of sins and when iced - and presented with a flourish at dinner - the cake looked perfect.
The sponge recipe :
225g unsalted butter
325g plain flour
50g cornflour
4.5tsp baking powder
0.5tsp salt
400g caster sugar
2tsp vanilla extract
4 medium eggs, lightly beaten
300ml whole milk
Cream butter, add sugar, add vanilla, add egg yolks, add flour (& other dry ingredients) and milk.
Whisk the egg whites separately and then add to the mixture.
Divide the cake mixture between as many bowls as you are making layers -
I made 4 sponges.
Add colouring and fold until the colour is vibrant and there are no white streaks.
Bake for 15 minutes in a 180C/160C fan oven.
Allow sponges to cool completely.
I made the filling/frosting with butter and icing sugar.
I added some melted white chocolate & then coloured it with a few drops of red food colouring.
When the sponges were cool, I stacked them filling in between each sponge as I went, I then, using a palette knife, used the filling to cover the cake completely.
If the sponges are a little wonky, just even it up by adding slightly more filling.
My final touch was to sprinkle some tiny raspberry pieces over the top of the cake.
The cake looked fabulous - even though I say it myself - and of course, the wow factor and the surprise, is when you cut into it and reveal the array of colours.
I think anyone would love this cake, it really does not take much time and of course, you can use any colours you like :)
