How do you bake a cake in different colours?

[ComeAlongPond]

You know, so that part of the sponge is one colour and part of it's another, sort of like a chessboard?

Like this: forever-and-alwayss.tumblr.com/post/3799469384

Yep it looks like she's baked two cakes and then cut very carefully into squares.

The angle is camera trickery - there's no way that checkerboard design goes all the way around. She's just cut it in exactly the right place.

Thanks :)

I found these instructions for making a round one so looks like it's sorted.

Ah! That's clever! :)

You lot have made me make a round battenburg cake. I've got one pink and one yellow cake in the oven. Will report back when they've cooled.

If you're going to make this cake - cutting and moving it can be tricky. Dh and I used two spatulas, some gentle manouvering and there was a bit of "get your elbow out of the way".

Cake is resting in fridge ready for icing.

Thanks for the tip threestars :)

You're welcome. I'm grateful for your OP as I now have lovely cake. It looks good (covered it in some soft royal icing), but the proof will be in the scoffing.

When are you planning on making yours?

Probably next weekend - for mine and a friend's joint birthday party. May do a practice one beforehand.

We were planning on using buttercream as icing, do you think that would work as well?

It is lovely! It really worked!

Not sure that buttercream would work. It would be nice enough, but it wouldn't have that Battenberg feel. Also, if your cake is anything like mine, you might some structural support from the icing - I made up some soft royal icing because the cakes had been cut so much I thought they'd need help to stick back together.

That's okay, it doesn't need to have a battenberg feel, just a big lush birthday cake feel :)

Never made royal icing before, everyone I know is just a massive buttercream fan so that's all that gets used. Could give it a go though if you think it would be best.

Don't take my advice about icing too seriously - I found a pack of royal icing sugar in the cupboard and felt guilty because it had been bought to ice a Christmas cake (can't remember which Christmas). I made it soft because I also had a bottle of glycerin that hasn't been used. My cake split a bit and I was worried that I was asking too much of the jam to hold it together.

If you can cut a cake without partially destroying it, then go for buttercream - few things are as nice as sponge and buttercream

You can get a less formal multicoloured cake effect by dividing your sponge mixture into smaller amounts, colouring each one separately and then lobbing it, a big spoonful at a time, into your cake tin. will come out looking the usual golden colour on the outsied but, when you cut it, you get a marbled effect.

Thats a good way to do it - no need for any structural engineering.

I make a splodgy marble cake by chucking spoonfuls in and I do one where I make sure the first colour is right in the middle of the cake tin, then the second colour goes right on top. If you keep layering it like that, you get a strata effect when you cut through it.

Okay, I think I'll see how successful the slicing and moving is before I decide on the icing!

wilton also have a kit for making a chequerboard cake it's often on ebay,quite pricey tho

Twenty two pounds! Twenty two actual pounds! Blimey, I'm in the wrong career. You need a piece of baking paper and a circle - I used a plate and a pastry cutter. Have you got one Seriously, or were you looking at cake porn?

Good luck CAP, I hope the cake comes out well.

lol
no i haven't got one!
i only invest that kind of money in tins and equipment that i will actually use regularly!
but yes i do enjoy alot of cake porn

Thank goodness. You could buy a lot of tins and ingredients for that money

I just had another slice with a cuppa. Still good. Buttercream would work, especially if made with a tiny bit of almond essence.

I really want to make another cake now. Must resist making Battenberg with chocolate and vanilla sponges.

You can make a kit for a chessboard cake with baking tins and some tin foil.

If your cake tin is 9", then make a 7" foil circle and a 5" foil circle, drop them into the tin before you put the mix in, and you can alternate the different coloured cake mixes between the foil dividers.

To get a good size cake, you need at least three layers, but I've used it a few times and it saves a LOT of faffing about.