Racing Bakes: British Victoria Sponge
There is no more British bake than a Victoria Sponge so what better way to celebrate the return of the British Grand Prix?
This weekend seen the 4th stop on the 2020 Formula 1 calendar, at the iconic Silverstone circuit, in Northamptonshire.
The home of British motorsport and, for some, the home of racing, generally, it's where it all began, 70 years ago. There's no denying that the British GP is an absolute classic, so this weekend deserves a classic bake.
I'm all for ambition and making really impressive, stand out, bakes but sometimes simplicity wins. The Victoria Sponge is one of those times.
There are many ways you can make a Victoria Sponge but I like to go for the simplest 'all in one' method, with plain cream and raspberry jam. If you have left over cream, you can ripple in some jam and put in the freezer to make ice cream!
A classic cake for a classic GP
Ingredients
- 4 eggs
- 200g plain flour
- 200g caster sugar
- 200g softened, unsalted butter
- 2 tbsp milk
- 200g raspberries
- 180g jam sugar
- 250ml double cream
- 2 tbsp icing sugar (optional)
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
Instructions
The sponge
- Grease and line your cake tin and preheat the oven to 190C (fan)
- In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, caster sugar, milk, softened butter and the eggs. Whisk till these are fully combined.
- Pour the whole mixture into the cake tin and bang on the surface to flatten and remove any bubbles.
- Bake for 30-35 mins but check after 20. If it's starting to brown too much round the edges, cover with foil.
- Remove from the oven and allow to cool in the tin. When it has started to come away from the sides of the tin, you can remove it from the tin and allow it to fully cool on a wire rack.
The jam
- Wash the raspberries and put them all in a pot, on a medium to high heat. As they warm, stir them to break them up.
- When the fruit has all broken up, add all of the jam sugar and stir in, till fully combined.
- Stir till the mixture starts to bubble, then leave it to simmer for 4-5 minutes.
- Pour the mixture into a jar, straining if you want to remove the seeds.
- Let it cool fully before putting it anywhere near the cream!
Cream
- Whip the cream, in a large bowl, till it becomes *just* stiff
- If you're a fusspot like me, add a couple of tablespoons of icing sugar, or some vanilla extract, to sweeten it.
Assembly
- Using a bread knife, or a fancy cake cutting thing, if you have one, cut the cake, horizontally, into two equal layers.
- On the bottom layer, spread a layer of jam. You can add as much or as little as you little as you like. I like to go generous!
- On top of the jam, add the cream. You can pipe it, if you want a enater finish, but I think it looks nice and rustic if you plonk it on and just spread it out.
- Finish by adding the top layer on top and decorate as you like. I think a dusting of icing sugar is pretty.
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Comments (10)
We both posted a victoria sponge recipe within 24 hours of each other, hahaha.
Great minds Hayley, great minds...
Great minds, indeed!
Looks yum!
It is really tasty!
I think that I might try this with blueberries and lemon in lieu of the raspberries.
Oooo let me know how it goes!
Looks simply great!
Thanks!
I'd never looked it up, but I always assumed it was made with strawberries! Luckily, I do like raspberries better. Thanks for sharing, looking forward to trying this 🙂
You can do either. I did one with cherries and buttercream last year and called it a twisted Vicky