Old-Fashioned Cakes

[Anna N]

My grandma's recipe stresses creaming the butter and sugar together, then whisking in the eggs one by one and folding the flour in gently to preserve the air bubbles.

Victoria sponge holds so many memories for me! It was baked by one of my aunts of a special Sunday morning and passed over the garden fence into Gran's garden where we were all gathered in anticipation. It was accompanied by a pot of cafe au lait and the best tea cups on a fancy tray. I am determined to master it but have made it a project for when Kerry Beal and I head north this summer. I hope I can come close to yours in loft!

[lapin d'or]

I made this Victoria sandwich cake with apricot jam and custard filling for a recent twitter Sunday bake-off @SundayBakeClub 

 

I use a stand mixer to cream the butter and sugar, arms getting old now!

 

I always weigh the eggs and then use that weight in flour, sugar and butter.

 

 

This book  http://www.louisejohncox.com/book.htm published earlier this year in the UK has a lot of recipes for old fashioned UK cakes and lovely stories about the bakery they come from.

[JohnT]

I made this Victoria sandwich cake with apricot jam and custard filling for a recent twitter Sunday bake-off @SundayBakeClub 

 

I use a stand mixer to cream the butter and sugar, arms getting old now!

 

I always weigh the eggs and then use that weight in flour, sugar and butter.

 

apricot victoria fin.jpg

 

This book  http://www.louisejohncox.com/book.htm published earlier this year in the UK has a lot of recipes for old fashioned UK cakes and lovely stories about the bakery they come from.

It has been a number of years since I made a Victoria Sandwich cake and now these posts have stirred up the memory of the simple cake. I have been hunting for my recipe which I kept in a folder, but cannot find it. So, I did a quick Internet search and most recipes for the VS cake use SR flour, which I do not buy or keep. So, does your recipe use cake flour or SR flour? And do you use soda or baking powder in it and if so, what quantities in relation to the butter, egg, flour, sugar mixture? Hopefully I will find my misplaced recipe folder. John.

[lapin d'or]

John, I use self raising flour most times but if I am working with plain flour I would add baking powder;

 

This ratio is taken from the Nigella Lawson website:   Just add 2 teaspoons of baking powder for each 150g/6oz/1 cup plain flour. 

 

Many VS recipes use self raising and some baking powder but if the SR flour is fresh it should have enough raising agent in it in my view.

[JohnT]

John, I use self raising flour most times but if I am working with plain flour I would add baking powder;

 

This ratio is taken from the Nigella Lawson website:   Just add 2 teaspoons of baking powder for each 150g/6oz/1 cup plain flour. 

 

Many VS recipes use self raising and some baking powder but if the SR flour is fresh it should have enough raising agent in it in my view.

Lapin d'or, thanks for the info. I actually found my old recipe just after your post was received and it has 5ml BP per 150g cake flour. I must admit I have not made a Victorian Sandwich for a few years, actually since 1979. We used to make small ones in the hotel I worked in, by the hundreds! They were baked in small 7cm moulds and we used to cut them and do strawberry, apricot, black cherry, chocolate buttercream and vanilla buttercream for the Argentinian tourists, it was always amusing watching them load up at the buffet - they used to take the biggest plates available and pile roast meats, veg, curry, fish and one of each dessert on the same plate. We stopped putting out ice cream and chocolate sauce as that used to be put on top of the roast meats. Ah, those memories! John.

[cakewalk]

Jelly roll. There's something about the swirls that I always loved. The other day I made a jelly roll from a Flo Braker recipe, one I've been meaning to try for ages. She slices the 10x15" sheet in half just like you would for a regular layer cake, then lines up the two pieces so you have a 10" by 30" rectangle. It's a bit of a challenge, since the cake is under one inch high. But since there's such a long strip to roll up, the effect is especially beautiful. (I took a photo but can't figure out how to post it. But I have to say the photo in the book was much nicer looking than mine.) 

 

Anyway, visuals aside, I thought the cake itself tasted too floury. There's a cup of AP flour and four eggs, I guess it needs the flour for structure since it's being mauled somewhat. Also, it's best to use as thin a layer of jam as possible since there ends up being so much of it. But the cake is so pretty, I want to get it to taste good, too. So I'll keep trying.