Victoria Sandwich

I was asked by my lovely husband to make a cake. A special cake, just for him. Specifically, a cake filled with cream. I do love cakes with cream in the middle so I agreed.

And the timing couldn't have been more perfect, as he asked just a few days before my copy of the Women's Weekly Sweet Old Fashioned Favourites arrived at my work book club. I had a quick flick through, and decided a Victoria Sandwich would do the trick nicely.

In all honesty, the recipe didn't actually have cream in the middle, only jam. But I figured since the jam was there already, cream would be fine.

Thoughts - not great. Not bad, but not great. Hubby was dissapointed first off because although it had cream like he has asked, it had no frosting on top. He also said it was like eating a slice of a very big scone. And he wasn't far wrong. The buttercake was a tad dry, and with the jam and cream it really was just like a big scone, but with one difference - vanilla extract. And you could really taste the vanilla extract. Usually vanilla is meant to be a subtle flavour, but in this cake it was a bit strong and as a result tasted a bit chemical, despite the fact I use a natural extract.

If I'm ever invited to a high tea I might consider making it again... maybe. But it feels more likely I'd try something different, in the hope I wouldn't be quite so dissapointed.

Funky flower cake

I haven't done much in my kitchen lately that qualifies as something new, so I haven't had much to blog about. But I've been watching a great show on Foxtel called Ace Of Cakes, and some videos on Youtube, and I'm feeling all inspired and want to practice my cake decorating skills. The hope is that I'll be able to develop my own little portfolio and start my own little cash in hand cake business.

The cake itself was an old favourite, the Chocolate Birthday Cake from the Crabapple Cupcake Bakery Cookbook. Since I was basically creating a prototype it made sense to use a recipe I was familiar with, because I could just slap it together quickly and focus on the decorating part.

I created the fondant flowers first. I made them a day ahead, using a cookie cutter I had on hand. The centres were just balls of fondant I flattened with my fingers. On the very last flower I decided to experiment, so I made a very thin sausage of fondant and would it into a spiral, which I used as the flower centre. I liked the look of the swirl much better, but by then the flowers were all glued together. So I'll use the swirl in future.

I used a crumb coating of chocolate buttercream, then a layer of rolled white fondant. Then in the morning I glued on the flowers.

Thoughts - I find people often complain there is too much icing on a cake, so I tried to roll out the icing incredibly thin so this wouldn't be a problem. It turns out there is a reason there is usually too much icing. The thin icing didn't completely cover the various lumps and bumps on the cake, so it looked a little rough. Also I found that the flowers turned out more cartoony than I was hoping. I was trying to achieve a wedding cake look, but instead wound up with something more suited to a birthday party. But then, that's the whole point of making prototypes, right? Overall I'm pleased though. I've learnt a few new tricks, and I've improved a bit since my handbag cake, and at this stage that's the most important thing, that my skills progress.