Victoria Sandwich Sponge Cake Revisited!

As-Salam Alaikum / Greetings Dear Reader,

Today I'm revisiting an old favourite of mine, the Victoria sandwich sponge cake which was named after Queen Victoria, who favoured a slice of the sponge cake with her afternoon tea.

To make this British Classic Cake I adapted Mary Berry's Recipe.

I used both apricot (dh favourite) and strawberry jam (my favourite) plus the optional whipped cream to fill my 22.5cm cake (original recipe makes a deeper sponge cake using a 20 cm cake tin) . 

Both self raising flour and baking powder are used to create an extremely light and tender sponge cake. I used the creaming method of making the sponge batter which gave yet even more lightness but feel free to follow Mary Berry's all in one method and you will still get an oh so soft sponge cake, it will be hard to resist taking an extra slice!

Victoria Sandwich Sponge Cake

Makes 1 x 22.5cm Cake

Ingredients

For the Cake

225g caster sugar (preferably Golden), plus extra for dusting the finished cake                                                                                      

225g softened/room temperature unsalted butter

4 large eggs, room temperature

225g self-raising flour

2tsp baking powder

For the Filling

8tbsp of your favourite jam, I used 4tbsp each of apricot and strawberry

300ml double cream, whipped (optional and can be substituted with buttercream icing)

Method

Preheat the oven to 160C Fan/180C/ 350F. Weigh all ingredients. Sieve flour and baking powder together, set aside. Cream butter and sugar together for about 5mins until light and fluffy.

Add eggs, one by one beating well after each addition, sift in your flour/baking powder, mix until well combined, don't over mix! .

Spoon the cake batter into your tin and smooth out with palette knife or the back of a spoon, make a slight indentation in the centre, this will ensure the top doesn't dome too much.  Bake on middle shelf of oven for 35 mins (I use an electric fan oven so you may need to adjust cooking time according to your type of oven) until a cocktail stick comes out clean or the centre springs back when pressed gently with a finger.

Remove from oven, place on cooling rack and leave to cool for 5 minutes, the cake should have started to shrink and come away from the sides so proceed to remove from your cake tin (I used silicone bake ware which makes this process a lot easier) place cake on cooling rack and leave to cool completely.

Slice cake in 2, put the flat bottom to the side, this will become the top of your cake. Spread Jam liberally over your other cake half. Whip double cream, I piped my cream on top of the jam layer using a regular circular tip and then smoothed it out using a palette knife but if your not worried about the jam and the cream mixing together or oozing out of the cake, spread the whip cream on top of the jam layer using a spoon / knife.

Place the remaining sponge cake layer on top and dust with caster sugar.

If you filled your Victoria sandwich sponge cake with whipped cream then it's essential to keep it chilled in the fridge until you are ready to take your first slice, I promise it won't be your last.

*Post updated from 13th May 2012