The Ultimate Victoria Sponge

The classic English afternoon cake, the Victoria Sponge is the perfect cake to impress. Having made & eaten copious amounts of VS since I was a little boy, I’ve perfected a recipe that always impresses. This version has some clever hacks to make your life easier without compromising on taste.

While butter icing isn’t the norm, my traditional method of making butter icing is well worth the time & effort. It makes a wonderful fluffy and silky smooth icing, that is nothing like the icing sugar and butter version your used to.

Ingredients

1 Large Cake (10 Slices)

For the Cake:

4 Eggs – (Around 250g in weight)

Golden Caster Sugar – Same weight as the eggs

Baking Fat/Margarine – Same weight as the eggs

Milk – 1 Tablespoon

Vanilla Paste – 1 Teaspoon

Self Raising Flour – Same weight as the eggs

Baking Powder – 1 Teaspoon

Pinch of Salt

For the Icing:

Plain Flour – 3 Tablespoons

Milk – 200ml

Unsalted Butter (Room temp, but firm) – 175g

Golden Caster Sugar – 175g

Vanilla Paste – 1 Teaspoon

Pinch of Salt

Strawberry Jam – 5 Tablespoons

Ingredients Tips:

Sugar: I use golden sugar, rather than white, as it has more flavour & helps give a lovely colour to the cake and icing.

Fat: For the cake mixture we use baking margarine as it gives a lovely fluffy light sponge. If you want to use unsalted butter, this will give a richer flavour but more dense crumb. Just make sure it is at soft room temperature. Always use butter for the icing filling to get a lovely buttery flavour.

Milk: Where possible use whole milk, which will give the cake more creamy flavour. You can get away with semi-skimmed milk if thats what you always have in your home, but definitely don’t use skimmed.

Vanilla: Paste is always better than essence as it is real vanilla bean paste suspended in a sugary syrup. The additional cost over essence is definitely worth it and you get the lovely tell tail black specs in your bakes.

Flour: Never buy the budget flour in your supermarket. Flour is quality graded with brands taking the best quality and then leaving the bits they don’t want for own brand supermarket flour. We always use Organic flour. I promise your bakes will come out better, more fluffy and a better crumb if you use quality flour!

Jam: If it’s good enough for your breakfast toast, its good enough for your beautiful cake. Pick a jam brand you already love and it will be perfect for your cake. If you prefer raspberry jam instead of strawberry this is a great substitute flavour combination too.

Method

Preheat your oven to 180C (350F) with the top & bottom heat setting if you have it. Butter & line with non stick baking paper, two 20cm metal sandwich tins.

1. Whisk the Golden Caster Sugar, Baking Fat/Margarine and Pinch of Salt together using an electric whisk or food processor. The mixture should turn pale yellow and look fluffy like firm whipped cream, this will take a couple of minutes of whisking. Then add the 4 Eggs one at a time until each is well combined. Add the Vanilla Paste and whisk into mixture.

TIP: Use a spatula to scrap down the sides of your bowl as you go to make sure everything is well incorporated at this point.

2. Sieve the Self Raising Flour and Baking Powder into the bowl and whisk again on the lowest setting until just incorporated together. Make sure not to over mix at this point, catch the stray flour around the edge of the mixing bowl and gently stir it into the rest of the mixture. Check the mixture is the right consistency at this point. It should plop off the spatula/spoon with a light tap, being soft and unctuous. If it is too firm add the 1 Tablespoon Milk to loosen the mixture a little and give another light whisk.

Tip: Whisking the mixture as little as possible once the flour has been added will stop the gluten developing. This will give the cake a beautiful crumb, being light and fluffy. Over mixing will make the cake dense and rubbery in texture.

3. Divide the mixture between the two cake tins. Make sure the top is smoothed as flat as you can with the back of the spatula and give each tin a light tap on the work surface to remove any small air bubbles. Bake on the middle of the oven for 25-30 mins until done. Once cooked, turn them out onto a cooling rack and carefully peel off the greaseproof paper.

Tip: To know your cake is perfectly baked, use a metal skewer in the middle of the cake to see if it comes out clean. If you don’t have one, the cake should be lightly golden in colour and the cake will spring back when you press with your finger in the middle.

While the Victoria Sponge is cooking its time to make the

traditional butter cream icing.

1. Place the Plain Flour and Milk in a small pan and whisk together on a low/medium heat. Continue to whisk until the milk is bubbling and thickened to a paste, similar consistency to wall paper paste. Set aside the pan and leave to cool.

Tip: Make sure the mixture is bubbling for 1 or 2 minutes. This ensures the flour is cooked and you don’t end up with a floury taste in your final icing.

2. In a clean bowl, using an electric whisk or food processor, whisk the Unsalted Butter and Golden Caster Sugar together. This needs to be whisked for around 5 minutes until the sugar is nearly all dissolved into the butter. Then add the Vanilla Paste and Pinch of Salt and re-whisk until well combined.

Tip: It is vital that you whisk long enough for the sugar to be well dissolved into the butter, otherwise you will end up with a grainy butter cream at the end. Also make sure you scrap down the sides of the bowl as you whisk, with a spatular, to make sure all the sugar is dissolved.

3. Put the milk and flour paste you have cooled, into the bowl with the butter and sugar mixture. Whisk again for 3-5 minutes until the paste is incorporated. The mixture will now be smooth, fluffy and ivory white in colour. If it isn’t smooth carry on whisking a little longer.

Tip: The butter cream icing will keep well in the fridge covered in film, so can be made ahead of time. Or if there is any leftover you can use for another cake.

Assembly

Put the less pretty of the two cakes on the bottom turned top down. Spread with the Strawberry Jam first, then a layer of butter icing. Place the top tier face up, so the two bottom sides of the cakes are now facing each other, sandwiched together, creating clean symmetrical lines. I also like to add a thin layer of butter cream to the top of the cake, so every mouthful of cake can have some delicious butter cream.

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