Individual Victoria sponges
You just can’t beat a good Victoria sponge – they are absolute proof that sometimes less is more. You don’t need fancy toppings or weird flavour combinations – you just need a good old fashioned, classic sponge sandwiched with jam (and cream if you’re feeling fancy) and dusted with sugar. Lakeland does the most fantastic tin for individual cakes – it’s a bit like a muffin tin but the sides are straight and the bottoms are loose. You can make all sorts in them – but my favourite thing to make is individual cakes.
I split my cakes and filled half of them with jam and half of them with chocolate butter cream, as I had some leftover! Either way, they’re best when dusted with icing sugar. Simple but delicious.
You need:
- 3 eggs
- 175g butter or Stork
- 175g caster sugar
- 175g self raising flour
- 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1 1/2 tsp vanilla bean paste
- jam for filling
- icing sugar for dusting
- a tin for individual cakes
- Preheat the oven to 180°c.
- Beat the butter and sugar until they’re pale and fluffy. Add the eggs and beat on medium until they’re combined. Add the flour and baking powder and beat until smooth. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and the beaters and add in the vanilla paste (use extract if you don’t have any paste). Beat again until smooth and well combined.
- Grease your tins with butter or cake release and half fill each tin. You don’t want to over fill them as they fluff up a lot and will over spill. If that does happen, you can cut the edges off when the cakes are cool.
Perfect for tea parties! (photo by Ashley) - Bake in the oven for 12-20 mins (depends on your oven!) until the tops of the cakes are golden and they are nice and springy to the touch. Stick a skewer in if you’re not sure – it just needs to come out clean.
- Leave to cool in the tin for 5 mins. Slide a palette knife around the edge of each cake and tip out. Carefully ease off the little metal discs and leave to cool completely on a wire rack.
- When they’re cold, use a sharp (ideally serrated) knife to cut each cake in half. Spread the middle with jam (and cream if you like) or pipe a bit of butter cream in the middle, then stick the top half on top, making the sandwich. Dust the icing sugar over the top and serve!
Enjoy!
