A Victoria Sandwich is a sponge cake, in two layers, filled with a cream or butter cream and with jam.
I used a recipe from Funky Foods, courtesy of an article by Hugh Fearnley- Whittingstall. In this recipe he says to weigh the eggs and use that weight as the basis to determine how much butter, sugar and flour to use.
It works very well indeed. The only difference, for my attempt, is that I put rather more batter in one tin than the other. The reason for this is that I wanted to try to ensure a flatter rise on one cake, so I didn’t have to cut the top off when using it as the base. This worked well, I just had to make sure that both were cooked through, which was certainly the case.
I also used buttercream, rather than fresh cream, for the filling, as this allows the cake to be left out of the fridge, in an airtight container.
Ingredients:
- Unsalted butter, softened, plus a little more for greasing
- 4 eggs
- Golden caster sugar
- Self-raising flour, sieved with a pinch of salt
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- A little milk, if necessary
- Raspberry jam
- Whipping cream (if you want a cream filling) or Butter Cream – 100 g of butter and 100 g of Icing sugar, beaten to a fluffly texture.
- Icing sugar or caster sugar, for dusting
Method:
- Heat the oven to 180C/350F/gas mark 4. Lightly grease two 20cm sandwich cake tins with butter, and line the bases of each with baking parchment.
- Weigh the eggs in their shells and weigh out the same amount of butter, sugar and flour.
- In a bowl, beat the butter until creamy, then beat in the sugar until light and fluffy.
- Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition, adding a tablespoon of sifted flour if the mix looks as if it’s going to curdle.
- Beat in the vanilla extract
- Gently but thoroughly fold in the flour. Now check the consistency of the batter. Scoop up a tablespoon of the mixture and hold it over the bowl. If it drops down fairly easily, it’s just right. If it sticks stubbornly in the spoon, fold a tablespoon or two of milk into the mixture.
- Divide the batter equally between the two tins and gently smooth the tops with a knife. Bake for 25-30 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean. Leave to cool in the tin for a couple of minutes, then turn out on to a wire rack to cool completely.
- Spread Jam on the top of one cake and then top that with whipped cream or butter cream.
- Place the second cake on top to complete your sponge cake.