Have 3 birthdays to deal with in the next week - what is the easiest cake I can possibly make?

[aliceinlalaland]

Not an experienced cake-maker but there are 3 b'days this week that I need cakes for. DD1 is having a big party and I am going to buy something for that because I'm not up to the job but I do need to make 2 normal-sized cakes. I'm looking for really simple recipes that do not need hours of preparation time. Any ideas?

Thank you

delia's all in one sponge - totally fool proof, I've made it 100's of times, and scaled up the quantities, it always turns out well.

www.deliaonline.com/how-to-cook/baking/how-to-make-all-in-one-sponge.html

Fairy cakes - decorated with lots of glitter and sprinkles.

That's brilliant Robyn - thanks v much. What's a tasty filling that doesn't involve jam?

xposted with pip - thank you. May do that for one of the bdays!

Yoghurt cake really simple, don't even have to weigh anything, just used the yoghurt pot to measure, and with oil instead of butter it is slightly healthier (until you slather it in butter cream!) Makes a lovely dense moist sponge.

Alice, if you don't want jam, try buttercream

110g butter
500g icing sugar
1 teas. vanilla
60 mls milk

Beat the butter then add vanilla and icing then as much milk as you need. You might not need all the milk. You can add colour to it if you want to

Oh and no creaming or folding, just chuck it all in the bowl and mix!

ooooh yes, butter cream.

or just melt chocolate and sandwich it/cover it in that - always a winner!

the delia recipe is v adaptable - add cocoa to make a choc cake, lemon essence to make lemon etc etc....

that's v useful re the buttercream - thank you. Presumably you could just chuck the juice of one lemon in for lemon butter cream?

I also love the yoghurt cake idea. Might do that for DDs first birthday as it's a little bit healthier..

Yes, a couple of tsp will do it, and you can add the rind of a lemon to give it a tang