If needed, you can keep the cooled cakes on the wire rack, draped with a clean tea towel, for a couple of hours before sandwiching. The bottom layer should be cooled top-side down, so as to help diminish any doming. Choose which cake you want on top – generally when I bake, I choose the thicker cake for the bottom layer, but with a Victoria Sponge, I go for the one which I think will look most appealing - and place that layer with the top uppermost to stop the rack leaving an impression. Take them out of the oven and leave on a cooling rack for 10 minutes before turning them out and removing the parchment.Place side by side in the oven and bake for 20–25 minutes, or until the deep burnished gold tops of the cakes are delicately springy to the touch and a cake tester comes out clean. Divide the cake batter evenly between the two prepared tins, and smooth the tops a little.
Once everything’s smoothly combined, start beating in the milk, one cautious tablespoon at a time (you shouldn’t need more than 3) until your batter drops easily off the beaters, paddle or wooden spoon when lifted up out of the bowl.Give a good scrape down, and then, gently, gradually but thoroughly beat in the rest of the flour mixture. Beat one egg into the creamed butter and sugar, followed by one tablespoon of the flour mixture and, once both are absorbed, continue in this manner until all 4 eggs are used up.In another, smaller, bowl mix together the flour, cornflour, baking powder and salt.Add the teaspoon of vanilla extract and beat that in, too. You can make the sponge with a processor – in which case just blitz all the ingredients together (except for the 2 teaspoons of sugar and the milk) including the extra half-teaspoon of baking powder, until you have a smooth batter, and then, with the motor running, pour in 2 tablespoons of the milk slowly down the funnel until the mixture has a soft, dropping consistency, adding the third tablespoon only if necessary - or you can make it with an electric mixer and, indeed, the old-fashioned way, by hand and if either of those is this case, start by creaming the butter and sugar, that’s to say, beating them vigorously together until very light and fluffy.Grease the sides of the tins with a small amount of butter and line the bases with baking parchment. You will need 2 x 20cm / 8-inch sandwich tins
As with so many simple pleasures, just savour it in the moment.įor US cup measures, use the toggle at the top of the ingredients list. I don’t advise making this in advance, as it stales quickly. Should you decide you wish to leave out the fruit, which in winter may be necessary, I’d add perhaps a little more jam, sharpened with a good spritz of lemon juice.Īnyway, this is the Victoria Sponge I’ve been making for decades, and I’m absolutely thrilled that it is now on the site. Here, I’ve used raspberry jam and raspberries, but I can tell you that some sliced strawberries with strawberry jam, or blackberries with their corresponding jam, are also to be considered. My version tinkers only a little with the traditional model: I use a mixture of flour and cornflour/cornstarch in the sponge, which creates cakes that are exceptionally light and tender and I add some fruit along with the jam.
Plain, airy cakes, sandwiched with sweet jam and smooth, whipped cream: it is no wonder that it has been such a favourite through the generations. A Victoria Sponge is one of the simplest cakes there is and quite one of the best.