Cooking with the Kids: VE Day Celebration Victoria Sponge

In the UK, our traditional May Day ‘Bank Holiday Monday’ was moved to the Friday, to mark the anniversary of VE Day. The expectation was for loud, happy street parties, miles and miles of bunting and flags and a feast fit for 1000s. Alas, it wasn’t to be as we all had to stay indoors. We wanted to mark the occasion though, and we decided to bake a Victoria sponge. Of course, it had to be decorated in patriotic red, white and blue too! Our resident chef, Toby, took charge as usual. Here’s how he got on …

Victoria Sponge – Ingredients

For the cake

• 225g sugar
• 225g self-raising flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 225g butter at room temperature
• Few drops of vanilla extract
• 4 eggs

For the buttercream

• 600g icing sugar
• 300g butter, room temperature
• Splash of milk

For the decoration

• Blueberries
• Strawberries
• Raspberries
• Raspberry or Strawberry jam

Method – Cake

1. Heat the oven to 160C.
2. Prepare two 20cm sponge tins – grease or spray them.
3. Into a mixing bowl add the eggs, sugar, flour, baking powder, vanilla essence and butter. Mix until combined.
4. Divide the mixture between the two sponge tins. Smooth the top of the mixture.
5. Bake for 20-25 minutes in the middle of the oven. They are cooked when a cocktail stick inserted into the middle comes out clean and the top of the sponge is golden brown.
6. Cool in tins for 10 minutes then turn out onto a cooling rack.

Method – Buttercream

1. Put butter and icing sugar into a large bowl and with an electric mixer carefully mix the two (the icing sugar will form a sugar cloud that will settle on every surface, so be super-careful!)
2. Once the mixture all mixed together you can speed up the mixer. Add a splash of milk if the mixture is too thick to spread easily.

Decorating

1. Place a small amount of buttercream in the middle of the cake stand. ‘Stick’ the base sponge down onto it.
2. Add a generous layer of jam across the top of the base sponge, followed by a layer of buttercream.
3. Sandwich the top sponge over the buttercream/jam. Push down gently until the fillings reach the end of the sponges.
4. Add a layer of buttercream to the top of the cake. Smooth it to the edges using a palette knife.
5. Slice some strawberries in two. These make the St George cross on the cake – lay them in a line from top to bottom and from left to right, crossing in the middle of the cake top.
6. Take some raspberries. These are to be the diagonal part of the flag, crossing through the middle again.
7. Finally, take some blueberries, and fill the little triangles that are left. What you should be left with is a rustic Union Jack pattern.
8. Sprinkle a little icing sugar over the top, before serving.

Final thoughts

It was a lovely cake. The easiest of basic sponge cake recipes, with simple yet effective decoration. We had a mini party in our garden (just the four of us), decorating the table in red, white and blue, and stringing bunting up around the parasol. It wasn’t quite the street party we imagined, but it was something, and it was fun. The cake was mostly eaten within 48 hours, but do refrigerate it when not cutting it as it keeps the fresh fruit on top fresher for longer.

More …

If you would like to see some of our other Cooking with the Kids recipes, please check out:

• Traditional Apple Pie
• Moist Carrot Cake
• Wahaca-inspired Chocolate Brownies
• Hot Cross Buns
• Easy ‘Cheats’ Marmalade