In early Jan, Big Sis was sooo generous and she bought us a Kenwood Chef Titanium mixer for us!
*Yay to Big Sis!*
With this mixer, our baking sessions became much less tedious as we do not need to use the handheld mixer anymore! We became so dependent on the mixer and even leave the folding step for the mixer to do it for us. Most of our baking sessions are a success now thanks to the mixer (: However, we are still unable to bake macarons successfully T.T
We borrowed this book which includes detailed step-by-step instructions and also pictures and it is one of our favourite baking book! This Victoria Sponge Cake recipe is from this book and it is superrr yummy. It tasted really like the old-fashioned kind of butter cake that our parents used to buy for us and we really loved it! It has been ages since we last ate it. We loved it so much and baked it once a week for at least 3 consecutive weeks!!
Equipment for Victoria Sponge Cake
- 20cm (8inch) round/square sandwich tins
- Baking paper
- Electric hand-held whisk or food mixer
Ingredients for Victoria Sponge Cake
- 250g very soft butter, plus a little extra for grasing
- 250g caster sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 4 eggs, large
- 250g self-raising flour
- 2 tbsp milk
Steps for Victoria Sponge Cake
- Preheat the oven to 180°C. Prepare the cake tin by greasing it well and lining the base with a piece of baking paper.
- Before creaming the butter and sugar together, the butter needs to be really softened. You should be able to easily push a knife right through the block of butter with little to no resistance. Dice and put it into microwave proof bowl and heat for 30s in the microwave on half power if it's not soft enough - but don't let it melt!
- Place the butter in a large bowl and add the caster sugar. Cream them together until the mixture has gone very pale. It should almost double in volume and you should no longer feel the texture of the sugar within the butter. This will take about 5-6 min.
- Add the vanilla extract to the creamed butter and sugar and stir together. Crack the eggs into a jug and beat them with a fork so that they are less likely to curdle when added to the creamed butter and sugar.
- Add a small amount of the beaten eggs, just a little drop and whisk them in fully. Add another drop and beat again. As you add more and more egg, the mixture will slip about as you whisk it - but keep whisking until the egg and creamed butter and sugar come together. It is important to do it step by step and whisk the air back into the mixture before adding the next drop of egg. Keep working this way until all of the egg is incorporated and you have a light and fluffy mixture - still packed with the air bubbles you've been working in (and not a sign of curdling!). If the air isn't worked back in after each addition, the mix will be very liquidy.
- Sift the flour if it is looking lumpy, otherwise it is ok not to sift it. Add the flour to the butter, sugar and egg mixture in the bowl. Using a thin edged spatula or metal spoon, fold in the flour, cutting through the mixture, lifting and turning it until all of the flour is incorporated.
- Add the milk and stir through.
- Pour the mixture into the 8 inch square tin and roughly level with the back of spoon. Try to avoid getting mixture up the sides of the tin if you can as this can give the finished cakes a little raised lips.
- Bake in the oven for 25-30 min until golden brown and when pressed lightly on top, the cake springs back up. Allow to cool in the tin for 5 min before removing and cooling fully on a wire rack. If left in the tin to cool complete, the cake will sweat and become soggy. It is fine to leave the paper on the bases as it cools.
Recipe adapted from: The Pink Whisk guide to cake making / Ruth Clemens.
Total Time Spent: 1 hour + 1 hour of cooling
