Christening cake

[StrawberryQuik]

Hi all,

I feel I may have bitten off a bit more than I can chew...
Basically, DS is getting baptised next month and I've really got my heart set on trying to make him a traditional Italian cake, something like this or this

I've bought a giant square baking tray and blithely told MIL that she doesn't need to buy a cake from the fancy bakery down the road because it'll all be fine...

I have many many questions-
Should I do normal sponge or a Genoise? For some reason I feel like I should make a Genoise?
Is there a filling in the middle? Patisserie cream?
How on earth did they make the fruit so shiny?

Heeeelp please

Hmmm where to start... I think genoise is traditional for something like this but what about a good solid Madeira in a tray bake? A couple of layers then it looks like the fruit is suspended in jelly making it shiny but I've no clue how they've done that without soaking into the sponge. I think as a cheats method, I would ice a double layered traybake of Madeira and pipe a strong boundary on top, then arrange the fruit as they have in the image and set with a tiny amount of lychee jelly? I honestly don't know what else to suggest!!

To make the fruit shiny, carefully apply either dissolved gelatine or vege-gel. This can be done with either a spoon or with a pastry brush, but the brush might be easier since you haven't done it before and don't want to soak the cake! It also preserves the fruit for longer!

Thanks both, I now have vege-gel, a pastry brush, and one of those long metal spatulas on my shopping list and my friend is going to come round early and do the whipped cream piping for me because I lack the knack for it.