HELP!!!!

[JUbilympiX]

I am making dd's birthday cake, which I do every year. She likes a Victoria sponge type, but she also likes to have angelica and glacé cherries added so that it is like little bits of buried treasure (my fault, it's how I described it when was 6!). The angelica and cherries always fall to the bottom, even if I chop them up really small and coat them in sr flour. I think it's because the cake mix is very light.

Is there anything I can do to get them distributed more evenly throughout the cake?

Her birthday's on Monday, so I'll be making and decorating the cake tomorrow. I need to buy anything I might need today....

Thank you!

I think you are correct re: sponge being too light. Delia (who I always turn to in times of cake trouble ) says:

"Fruit sinking: This is usually a fault in the recipe. It means the mixture is too slack (too liquid) to hold the fruit. Fruit cakes need a larger proportion of flour in order to hold the fruit evenly. Glace cherries and other sugar-coated fruit should be rinsed and dried (and chopped if large) before adding to a cake mixture. Both the size of the fruit and sugar coating can cause sinking."

Would she accept something lighter like raisins in it in addition to the glacé cherries? A la spotted dick they should stay on top.

She hates raisins!!

I'll do the extra flour thing. Thank you, Tiredness. She won't notice that it's more Madeira-like, I'm sure.

I use 6 oz flour, with baking powder added, so I'll use 9oz (omg, that sounds a lot), but still only 3 eggs, and 6oz butter and sugar. I'm a bit nervous of doing it as my beloved mixer stopped working and has gone back to Kenwood for mending, so I'm going to have to do it the old-fashioned way, like I grew up with.

Oh! should I use milk (I don't usually) and if so, how much?

Try not to add milk - it counteracts the extra flour, thins the mixture, and lets the fruit sink again.

A slight twist is to use ground almonds in place of the extra flour. Thats how I make cherry cake.

Yummy!

Hmm, almonds eh?

DH hates almonds, but he may not notice....

OK, no milk.

Tiredness, my mixer can't cope with anything as it's at the factory being mended!

I have just remembered I have an old electric whisk somewhere. I could use that for getting the eggs mixed in. Could I use it for the flour as well, or would that beat out the air?

Mary Berry says its because either the mixture was too runny to support the fruit, the fruit was too wet or the wrong fat was used. I think the right fat is butter. Or margarine which is over 80% fat. HTH

I was going to use Lurpak Spreadable as that's what we've got, but it's 69% butter. Maybe I should just get the real stuff, and persuade let dd cream the sugar in

Hooray I can use the electric thing I've got (my arms are v weak and painful due to ms, so I was dreading having to do it all by hand).

Thank you! I am making it today after all - just waiting for the Lurpak to soften a bit more. She always wants really complicated decoration and it takes me all day, so if I cook it today, decorate it tomorrow, I'll be able to do all the other catering on Monday.

Phew. Every year I say this is the last time, we'll have a couple of friends over and take them to the cinema or something, and every year it's an outing, tea with complicated cake, sleep-over. She tells me she'll be doing this until she's at least 30!!!