Please can you help me with your most simple sponge cake recipe?

[driftwoodsands]

Please help! I need a foolproof recipe for a really simple Victoria sponge (or similar) that will fit into a 10'' cake tin. It is DD's birthday and I have foolishly said I will bake a cake so that she can decorate it... I have NEVER successfully made a cake If I do manage it, how could she decorate it? She wants to put things like chocolate buttons on it. How could they stick on? Thank you!

Mary berry or delia all in one sponge is pretty fool proof..

You could add coco powder to make it chocolate.

Decorate with white icing and stick things on or melted chocolate.

I'm sur others will be along with better ideas soon

Buy a box of Betty Crockers Devil Cake mix
It is delightfully chocolatey & is homemade (just the ingredients weighed out for you!)
Cover in Betty Crocker frosting & let your dd stick on the chocolatey decorations

I'm not too good at the sponge bit, someone more helpful will hopefully come along, but I'm pretty good at toppings!

easiest filling and topping - chocolate ganache: warm a big pot of double cream (300ml) until almost too hot to put your finger (clean!) in.
Take off heat, break up 200g of dark chocolate and 100g milk chocolate into pieces, put into cream and stir until all melted and then goes shiny.

put in cake, on top of cake, around cake, smooth with a big knife warmed by dipping in hot water.
Put maltesers, buttons, flake or any other chocolate on top. It will stick onto the ganache as long as you don't wait too long

gorgeous.

6 oz self raising flour
6oz caster sugar
6oz cooking marge or butter
Vanilla essence
3 large eggs
Cream the fat and sugar, add few drops of essence. Beat in eggs sliwly with a handful of flour to stop curdling, using wooden spoon. Then fold in remainder of flour with metal spoon and divide into samdwich pans and cook gm4 about 25 mins depending on your oven.

Num tum that's exactly what I do (BeRo receipe??)

OP the secret is makig sure the fat and the sugar is creamed really well it shouldn't be grainy and turns a slightly lighter colour.

4 oz everything and 2 eggs makes a standard cake

Weigh three eggs (in grams). Use the same weight of self-raising flour, caster sugar, and soft butter/Stork. Add a little drip of vanilla extract.

Beat together preferably with electric beaters.

Line the bottom of your tin, preferably with silicon paper (easiest to peel off later).

Bake at 170 for about half an hour. It is done when golden on top, and prodding the top springs back, or if you stick a skewer in and it comes out just greasy, not covered in mixture.

Leave to cool on a wire rack. If brave, carefully slice in half (to make two circles). Stick back together with jam.

If you want to decorate, you need icing. Most reliable is buttercream. For a ten-inch cake you'd need about 400g icing sugar, 60g unsalted butter, and 30ml milk. Beat together until fluffy.

Use a palette knife, plastic spatula or plastic children's knife to spread the icing on to the cake. It will set when left alone. Meanwhile you can stick stuff to it eg sweets, sprinkles, edible glitter.

Weigh 2 large eggs or 3 small (in the shell). Weigh out the same amount of self raising flour, sugar, butter. Add a level teaspoon of baking powder to the flour. Beat butter and sugar together until light & fluffy. Beat eggs together and add to the butter & sugar mix a little bit at a time - mix well between additions. Add flour, half teaspoon of vanilla and a couple large spoons of milk. Give it a stir and tip into a tin buttered and floured or lined. Cook for 25 min at 160deg C.

I find it better to go longer at a lower temp and to push the mix so it is higher at the edges than the middle so the finished cake is flatter.

I'd go for an all in one if you're a bit if a novice. This one by Mary Berry is pretty well behaved. The other really good one is Nigella's butter milk birthday cake. here.

I bake 10" cakes in two layers. It's much easier and gives a nice deep cake.

For a 10 " I do 5 eggs per layer which produces a cake that's about 1.25 − 1.5" deep.

4 eggs give you a layer about an inch deep.

I make celebration cakes so usually trim the top of each cake before I sandwich and ice them so I have a perfectly flat and level cake, hence the deeper layer to begin with. If you're happy just to slap the layers together then a 4 egg mix will be fine.

I know lots of people swear by the 'chuck it all in a bowl and beat' method but it doesn't work as well as the creaming method, for me.

For a 4 egg mix, I use 8oz Stork and 8oz caster sugar, plus a splash of vanilla essence. Beat with a hand mixer or KitchenAid thingy for 5 minutes until it's pale and fluffy.

You'll need to use 4 medium eggs and 8oz self raising flour - add the eggs one at a time with a heaped tablespoon of flour and mix well before you add the next one. Mix in the rest of the flour, pour into tin and cook for 50 - 55 mins in a non-fan oven preheated to 160 degrees.

Repeat for the second layer.

Spread the top of one layer with jam and the bottom of the other layer with buttercream and sandwich together.

Spread buttercream over the top as well, if you want to be able to stick stuff to it.

If you do a 5 egg mix you'll need 10 oz each of butter, sugar, flour.

Good luck!

Without wanting to be critical of other posters, a 2 or 3 egg mix will not be enough for a 10" tin.

To get a decent height cake, I use 3 eggs per layer in an 8" tin.

2 eggs does a layer in a 7" tin.

Is your tin round or square, driftwoodsands? You'll need more mixture in a square tin because it has a higher volume than the same size round tin.

For 10 inch you'll need:

5 eggs
10 oz butter
10 oz castor sugar
10 oz self raising flour

Beat sugar and butter together until light and fluffy.
Add beaten eggs, a little at a time
(Add a half teaspoon of vanilla extract = yummy)
Fold in SIEVED self raising flour
Divide mixture between 2 tins, which you have greased and lined with greaseproof paper
Bake in pre-heated oven at 180 for 25 -30 minutes
(don't go opening oven door, cake'll drop)

When baked, remove from oven, leave for 5 minutes, then turn out onto cooling rack and leave to cool completely before using any buttercream etc

Buttercream - basically half fat to icing sugar, so 5 oz butter to 10 oz icing sugar then add small dribbles of milk till right consistency.

Alternatively, buy the buttercream!!!!

Ooops I did forget to say mine was for 7in pans.

Good point, LadyD. I was thinking about my eight inchers

Fortunately my recipe scales up so start by weighing five or six eggs...

OP says she only has one tin. Pointless giving sandwich tin instructions in that case. Cook longer and cooler.

You are all amazing. So kind & helpful to share your knowledge. Thank you. It's a 10'' round tin (I have borrowed it from a friend!) and am going for it tonight... will weigh eggs (5?) & do my best. I have bought nice chocolate swirls and purple glitter for DD to decorate it tomorrow. I will report back. Thank you all.

Good luck! I'm sure whatever you
produce will be a triumph.

Good luck! I'm sure whatever you
produce will be a triumph.

I made it! I used 4 eggs and weighed them. It looked good, especially after DD had liberally sprinkled it with chocolate buttons, sprinkles, chocolate curls and other bits. It even tasted good. She was delighted to have a home-made birthday cake that she was able to decorate. Thank you for all the good advice. I am even considering making another one, now I understand how to do it

Driftwood, i know its abit late now but for the future and i'm sure there will be more cakes now you've successfully made you first one, i agree with Ladydamerel, the creaming in method works better for me too as it gets the butter and sugar as light as poss. Good luck with your 2nd cake just dont give up.

Congratulations OP! So glad it all went well.

For extra body you can also whip the egg whites separately from the rest.

Personally I chuck it all in together and use electric beaters until it looks the consistency of shaving foam