ANope Bashini, not guessing, they really are little, but I started again and they are teeny tiny bit bigger, ha ha.

Well this cake has been a nightmare looked at the icing tonight and there were lots of cracked in there and very dry looking, so tried to rub it out and the cracks were getting bigger, so I thought of it and took the fondant off, can you believe I did that? I am nuts I tell you!

Natt, how'd did it go?

AYou are welcome Jean! :smile:

Thanks Sugarluva!!:)

Barbara, I had to face lots of problems when I did the cupcakes. Starting with the a lost parcel and then the shop not sending my 8" round cake drum. So I had to quickly go to a nearby cake shop and had to buy a 10" flower board but it turned out beautiful!! Next, when I was about to cover the cake drum I didn't have any white sugar paste. So again had to pop into sainsbury's to get sugar paste. And then I coloured some buttercream red but it turned out orange. So I iced all of them white and I think all looked great. And so my dear whatever you do, it will turn out great! :grin:

AThanks MBalaska. (I owe you two weshcakes now!) Jo Field started a thread askung what temp and how long to cook a 9 inch square cake, I suggested she ask here but I think I was a bit misleading, she thought she'd asked in the wrong place. So, because I feel bad now if any of you know the answer (I'm sure you all do, I'm the only doofus on this thread!) would you be kind enough to go to the thread titled "victoria sponge help" please? Sugarluva, I asked that yesterday! I din't know what I want to do for a cake on the 12th. Somebody (can't remember who) posted a lush picture of a two tier cake, ruffles on the bottom, quilting on the top. And simebody else suggested cute little pigs in mud cupcakes. Hope you're feeling better soon btw. Nanny, still waiting to see your trainers! Natt, how did the interview go (and are you still in cardiff?!) Mmm, I love coffe cake Jean, especially if it's got walnuts in it!

Kathy, hope everything's ok with you. Off to bed now, My little gorls well enough for school tomorrow, yay! G'nite all. :-)

Nanny -  I'm sure it'll work out fine!! Like bashini said, it all turns out well in the end, even if its an infuriating journey along the way!

Bashini - your cupcake tower is wonderful!

Maisie - you are not a doofus!

Ok, so I survived the drive, just about!, had changing weather every 5 minutes on the way up, everything from bright sunshine, to rain, to darkness (everyone with headlights on at 2 in the afternoon!), had a couple of run ins with sitting water on the M4 as well... And I only got a little bit lost trying to find the restaurant, made one wrong turning and it all went a bit pete tong for about 20 minutes and then I got back on the right road. I think the interview itself went pretty well, I managed to answer all of her questions confidently, learnt some more about the company and actually left really excited about the opportunity, just need to wait for a response by Friday now. I met up with a friend who lives in the area after, I figured if I was making the journey anyway I might as well make the most of it! But the next interview (if I get through!) will be alot closer to home thankfully, and the manager it would be with is a local guy. So all in all, I'm not hugely confident about it, but I gave it my best!

Sounds like it went well Natt, my fingers are crossed for you. 

Maisie- oh yes I remember seeing those suggestion cakes now. I would love to make the pigs in mud cakes at some point because theyre so cute but I feel like I've made them a few too many times to be for my mums birthday. And I love the other cake but feel like its a bit far out of my league to attempt that! I'll have a think and see what I can find out there...

nannycook - looking forward to seeing your cake!

Hi cake mates!  I'm back!  Still might have to "drop out" at short notice but I have missed so much!  Sheesh.  Nice cakes Bashini - weird backdrop though - I thought those were real people!  Natt - so glad you got to your interview .... fingers crossed.  Maisie - glad your little one is feeling better - it's always worrying when kids are ill no matter their age.  Can't wait for your shoe cake Nanny......

MBalaska - I couldn't even find the Victoria sponge post......I would need a WI member to coach me on the perfect sponge - so I'm not much help anyway.  Nice to see you on here too!  I could only offer you bread pudding - as a representative of London's East End - I'm pretty sure it's from all over the place but I honestly cannot think of anything derivative to where I come from!

Sorry if I have missed anyone out - you are all so chatty!

ha ha I got some good WI advice once for vic sponge: leave out one egg from your recipe and replace it with milk

it makes a big difference I much prefer it! :)  

Ok then Experts.......will this do for a start into traditional UK baking??  fingers crossed!!

►   http://cakecentral.com/a/easy-traditional-english-victoria-sponge-cake

Posted by nataliehix

Ingredients

• 200g Caster Sugar
• 200g Butter
• 4 Large (or 5 medium) eggs
• 1 tsp Vanilla Extract
• 200g Self Raising Sponge flour (this has a lower gluten content, so gives a lighter sponge) If you don't have sponge flour, you can use normal self-raising flour and a pinch of extra baking powder
• Glug of milk
• For the filling---- Pot of whipping Cream,   Raspberry Jam

Got it.  finish with a dusting.  and I'll try it with 4 eggs, and then your way with 3 and a bit of milk. thanks Crazy-Gray. And masie will share her Welshcakes someday.

A[IMG]http://cakecentral.com/content/type/61/id/3227752/width/200/height/400[/IMG]

Ta da. And a pic of those flipping trainers, grrr!!!

MBalaska - personally I would weigh the eggs (they should be the same weight at the rest of the cake ingredients so 200g in this case) and I would avoid adding extra baking powder, normal SR flour is adequate for a victoria sponge and if you add extra baking powder you risk it over rising and the cake collapsing... but that's possibly just me, everyone has different ways of executing a victoria sponge, I'm a bit of a purist.

I can't wait to see your results though!

My basic welsh cake recipe if you'd like to try it

Thanks for all the crossed fingers guys!

A[IMG]http://cakecentral.com/content/type/61/id/3227753/width/200/height/400[/IMG]

Nanny -  your trainers came out awesome!

AAw natt, do you think so? Found them sooooo hard to do, so fiddly, these were my 2nd attempt, after my disastrous icing as well.

Ye, they have so much detail on them! The soles and everything have the little details that make them look more real!

Hi Nanny - I've been checking in frequently just to see these shoes and they are absolutely blinkin' brilliant!  What are they made from?

Kathy

AHi Kathy, just renshaw black sugarpaste, never again!! Got to me some pansies next for a cake on Fri, ever made them?

No Nanny - never made pansies but they are so pretty - I love violas personally.  I think you did a great job though on the shoes - I prefer that sort of cake to the "pretty" ones to be honest.

Kathy

AThank you gray.

No non wired pansies and I have a mold so was gonna give that a try and if not then try the single petal way, who knows eh?

Hi MBalaska thanks for trying to find me an answer on my original question. How long to cook a 9 inch square (3” deep) sponge cake for.

Can I just elaborate on what is happening to me a little and people can see maybe where I’m going wrong.

Basically I usually cook a Victoria sponge cake for all my cakes in the standard 2 x 8” sandwich tins, the recipe I use is Nigella Lawson’s from her HOW TO BE A DOMESTIC GODESS (lol). In this she sacrifices 25g of flour for cornflower which makes the sponge lovely in my opinion, and uses 225g of all other and 4eggs. I have been practising various types fondant covering designs on these cakes and getting quite good at it! People love love my cakes and I really wanted to be able to use this recipe to scale up to big tins, as my friend is getting married in a year’s time and she really wants my sponge cake recipe for her 3 tier wedding cake.

On the strength of this I purchased a whooping set of 4” – 14” tins in both round and square with an aim to get practising !

Now I have failed twice now in trying to bake a 9” square sponge cake in my one tin. 1st attempt I used 360g sugar, 360g butter, 360g self raising (thought I would drop the cornflower as maybe would make cake too fully and not stackable) and 7 eggs. This cooked sort of ok a bit clumpy though, but the main fault was I could in no way cut a layer into this as was just too thin. 2nd attempt was Sunday and I then calculated depth of tin and tried to reach ¾ full, baked 550g of all ingredients and actually weighed the eggs to be sure ! I cooked this cake with a large flower nail in the centre as heard this could help with the cloggy middle, also same as before with the wet towels, bowl of water on bottom shelf to prevent drying out and a baking sheet on top shelf to prevent the top from burning (as per my Lindy Smith book suggests). I baked this cake for 1hr45 in a fan assisted oven at 160c checked it after 1hr30 and think this caused a slight sink and the middle slumped, the skewer came out unclean so it went back in for another 15mins then it came out clean a little greasy but not raw mix on it so I presumed this was ok. I took the cake out and cooled in pan for 15mins then transferred on side with tea towel over night. I came to cut it in half yesterday in order for me to fill and it was yucky !! So very dense and heavy not nice at all a far far cry from my fullfy sponge, so was not going any further with it !

Can anyone of you experienced bakers help me to realise where I have gone wrong please ? In my head my next steps after searching the internet, are to switch from fan to conventional oven and to bake small individual layers and filled them instead. I’m clearly no expert at large cakes but I do really want to crack this so would love to hear all your thoughts and suggestions please, as I am currently tearing my hair out and wasting a lot of time and indeed money on wasted unusable cakes. Someone on my Facebook page has suggested a 32oz mix in the 9square and bake this 3 times and then fill and cover ready for stacking so my next thoughts are to try this as her pics looked FAB !

Await your comments and sorry to sound soooooo inexperienced and silly !

ADoing the thinner layers of batter would probably help prevent the problem, I actually bake larger cakes on 140c, so very low, it takes a bit longer but created an even bake.

I do the same as Natt and I don't use anything round the edge of the pan, just a flower nail in the middle for larger pans.

Jo there's a couple of things I can think of:

1 - to scale up accurately you need to calculate pan volumes, if the delia recipe makes two 1" layers each in its own pan that is a total volume of 100 cubic inches, if you want a 3inch deep 9 inch square that's 243 cubic inches so you need to make two-and-a-half times the recipe (243/100=2.43) I always round up because larger cakes tend not to rise as much.

2 - don't poke the cake at the critical point! there is a point that poking/moving/turning the cake will make it sink, at this point the top is turning golden and the middle is all wet and bubbly but not very strong. its easy to think it needs to be tested at this point but don't. When testing scale ups I bake for longer than it needs never even opening the oven door, the top is dark golden brown and if you lightly touch the top of the cake there is no 'wobble' just firm cakness (lol!) and a wooden skewer comes out just a bit greasy. next time I bake this size I check it 10 mins before I took the last one out and if it was done I check 10 mins earlier next time and so on until I have the perfect bake time.

cylinder volume calculator: http://www.online-calculators.co.uk/volumetric/cylindervolume.php

nannycook that cake looks great you did a really good job on those trainers!

I'm afraid I cant be of any help with the victoria sponge I haven't made them many times and usually only smallish ones.

Natt, here are a couple of sites that you may want to look at;

Wilton Home : Wedding : Wedding Cakes : Wedding Cake Data  Not sure of the exact address but that should help you find  the chart that tells you how many cups of batter you use for different size tins

Quaint Cakes has a recipe conversion table by Janet Henderson.

Not sure how good these charts are but they looked interesting enough for me to download.  They might help you with conversions between tin sizes.

Sorry to butt in but is a Victoria sponge going to be strong enough?  Just wondering ..... I did my last wedding cake as half sponge and half fruit - I had to make a Madeira style cake to take the weight of the decoration.

Hi everyone, I was only away for one day and have missed lots. I was at the dentist getting a tooth pulled and if that wasn't bad enough the mother in law decided to pay a visit, only problem is she never wants to leave.

Maisie I'm glad you little girl is feeling better.

Natt sounds like your interview went well.

Bashini the cupcake tower looks fab.

Nannycook great job on the trainers cake they look so detailed 

Welcome Joe field and hi to everyone else I might have missed. I have a job painting some rooms so i will speak to you ladies tomorrow have a great day.

Thanks for your comments, yes I had wondered about the sponge cake and thought of doing madeira instead. I have been asked to do a christening cake to do in the 9" square and 6 " on top. They want choc on top which I also cooked on Sunday all in one tin this came out perfect though !! Think with just a two tier cake I could get away with sponge ?

Even if I poked the cake would this effect the whole cake's texture  and cause density though out ? I would think this would affect only the middle ?I was doing this cake late at night maybe I got the mix wrong ! Would anyone suggest a time to bake a 9" 3/4 full at 140 ?

Also do you all bake with fan or no fan please ??

Seems like a very helpful site - thanks ;-)

Firstly Jo - sorry I forgot to "welcome" you to the thread before.  Secondly - I use a fan oven and bake at 140 normally.  However, recently we had a bit of a giant cupcake issue with the cake being dense and I was recommended to turn up the heat (plus I might use the nail now I know what everyone else does!).  I am not fan of electric ovens but have had mine for 7 years now and probably won't change unless I move.  This site is full of the most amazing bakers and they are so happy to help you.  I have only been on here since March and I am so pleased I found it. And we don't just chat about cake, you know!