Traditional Battenberg

This month my recipe is actually a traditional bake made in the standard way, rather than my crazy version of it (makes a nice change, I know!). I personally think it is wonderful just as it is and rather a forgotten gem of a cake. When I used to make cakes to sell, this one was always a crowd pleaser – it’s a lovely, nostalgic cake for so many people. Perfect in the afternoon sunshine with a hot cup of tea.
The most difficult bit of this bake is actually prepping the pan to section off the four sponges: but its worth the extra time for such a tasty end result! – Heather x

Ingredients

• 225g / 8oz butter
• 225g / 8oz sugar
• 4 eggs
• 225g / 8oz self raising flour
• Pink food colouring
• Jam (traditionally apricot but any jam will do – I used raspberry)
• 500g marzipan

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180º fan/gas 6.
2. In a 22cm x 33cm (9”x13”) baking tin, line the bottom completely with greaseproof paper. Then take extra greaseproof paper and fold so that the pan is sectioned into four strips (see picture below right).
3. In a stand mixer (or with an electric whisk or with a wooden spoon), beat together the butter, sugar and vanilla in a bowl really well. The mixture will become light and fluffy, and the colour will turn pale. Add in the eggs one at a time, beating well between each egg. If the mixture curdles slightly, add one spoonful of the flour and continue to beat well.
4. Slowly stir in the flour. Take care not to beat hard and knock out all of the air that you just worked into the mix!
5. Carefully spoon half of the mixture into two of the strips in the tin and spread out evenly.
6. Add a tiny amount of pink food colouring to the remaining mixture and stir through so the mixture is pink in colour. Carefully spoon this pink mixture into the two remaining strips and spread out evenly.
7. Bake in the oven for 20-25 minutes until the sponge is cooked (firm and springy to the touch). Take out of the oven and leave to cool completely.
8. Remove the cakes from the tin and peel off the paper. Trim the sponges until they are roughly the same shape. Although traditionally this cake is square, they don’t have to be square if they all bake to a naturally more rectangular shape (as mine did) – they just have to be the same size as each other. Spread a thin layer of jam along all the long sides of the sponges and stack them together into a cube (see finished picture for what I mean here).
9. Dust your work surface with a little icing sugar and roll out the marzipan so that it will go around the cake. Carefully drape it around the cake and neaten the edges. Cut the ends off the cake to finish so that the checkerboard effect is revealed (as a kid, those end off cut pieces were my favourite bit!).