#ROTM

Birthday Cake 

I’ve been a bit slack with my recipes of the week/month and what better way to get back into it than with a birthday cake!

This month’s #ROTM is a delicious recipe from Rachel Allen’s Cake book and was a request from Mr B. It was his birthday after all, so of course he got to choose the cake.

I have only made this Victoria sponge recipe once before and by memory it was a hit, although for some reason, I do fear making sponge cakes. I don’t know about you but I always feel under pressure when baking for a special occasion. Why is it that when you bake ‘just because’ it turns out so well you think you could enter a baking contest, but when you know you will be serving it up to others, there is always some kind of baking disaster!

Thankfully Mr B is the kindest person I know when it comes to my cooking so regardless of how it turns out, I know it will get eaten. The recipe is simple and easy to follow, butter, sugar, eggs, flour. It says to divide the mixture between two same sized tins but unfortunately I only have one round cake tin so I put the entire mixture in and figured I’d cut it into two halves once it was cooked and completely cooled. Not quite a baking disaster but doing it this way brings its own problems. Uneven halves and as you can see, no clean edges, but you can only work with what you’ve got.

My cake didn’t rise as much as I’d hoped but not to worry, I piled it with homemade jam and cream to create the illusion of height!

Birthday or no birthday, this buttery, sugary delicious sponge, served up to someone special was well worth me facing my baking fears.

xo