Jamie, no opening the oven door during baking to take piccies.  I know you happy-snappy chaps!

To make that recipe easier to remember, weigh the eggs first and use their weight in butter, sugar and flour. It's similar to pound cake - four ingredients, same weight of each.

I just use self-raising flour and don't add extra raising agent - must try Earthmum's recipe and compare.

Last edited by hippytea (Thu 31 Jan 13 9:18pm)

wine-o you weigh the eggs in their shells

Victoria sandwich ..

ingredients..
*eggs
*caster sugar
*butter ( dont be tempted to use margarine , olive spread or spreadable butter , use the block butter )
*self raising flour (or plain flour with a raising agent added.) Sieve the flour in readiness for it being used.this does 2 things it removes and lumps in the flour ad it adds air into the flour


method

prepare  your 'sandwich tins' ( cake tins with low sides ) do this by greasing the sides of the tin with a little butter then shaking a bit of flour around the edges and base of the tin , yu can alsoput a circle of baking parchment on the base of the tins as well but if you are using greaseproof paper you need to greese it with a little butter


*you need to cream together the butter and the sugar till they are really very very pale and fluffy

*beat the eggs  in a seperate bowl tand add a little egg at a  time carefuly mixing it in as you dont want to knock out the air that you have put into the butter and sugar mix.
tip.. if you add a small spoonfull of flour with the egg it helps prevent the mixture curdling.

*using a large metal spoon , add about 1/3 of te flour and carefully start to fold this in , do the same with the rest of the flour.
you need to be gentle when you do this as you dont want to knock out the air you have put into the mix .
(Do NOT be tempted to fold in the flour with a wooden spoon as it will knck out the air frm the cake batter,always use a matal spoon when floding flour into cakes ).
* divide the mixture between your 2 sadwich tins and lightly spread it out evenly.
I sometimes put a little dip into the center of each cake so that they come ut of the oven looking flatter'

bake in the middle shelf of the oven for around 20 minutes. at around 180 degrees centigrade
do Not open the oven door .

you can tell when the cake is  cooked by several things...
1. the smell of the baking cake changes a bit and becomes more dominant ( as I am useless at time keeping I always notice this !!)
2. if you check the cake in the oven you will notice that it has shrunk away from the sides of the tin just a little
3 if you lightly press in the center of the cake , the cooked cake will spring back into the original shape, if it does not spring back then it is not ready to come out of the oven.

turn the cooked cake onto a wire cooking rack and once cooled sandwich the 2 cakes together with a generous layer of good quality jam , is usuall to use strawberry of raspberry jam for this .

you can use this cake mix for making little fairy cakes or as a base for other cakes.
Its a good recipe t teach children as they remember it and like weighing things out so its easy of its the same amount.

whilst Jam is a traditional filling for a Victoria sadwich , some people vary the filling and topping by using butter crean or fresh cream .
one of my daughters favorite cakes is to have fresh whipped sligtly sweetened cream and fresh raspberries in the middle of the cake rather than jam

Margarine is, frankly, plastic!  Haven't had it in the house for years.  Only block butter for me.  It's easy to soften, if necessary.