Nic Dempsey

The Friday before my birthday I had a party, it involved people, cocktails, pizza and cake. The cakes were, ginger muffins, pavlova and this cake. I knew I would be making the cake the day before the party and this one looked easy to make and I was interested by the addition of custard powder.

Despite the bad photos (this is what you get for baking late at night!) this is a really great cake. It all comes together in the food processor and it’s just like a really good victoria sponge. In fact that’s exactly how I treated it, there’s whipped cream and jam in the middle. It was so good and so easy to make, I made another one to take into work the following week. The only thing you have to do ahead of time is make sure the butter is soft.

The recipe comes from Feast by Nigella Lawson.

What

200g plain flour

3 tablespoons custard powder

3 teaspoons baking powder

half a teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

4 eggs

225g soft butter

200g caster sugar

How

Put all the ingredients except the milk into the food processor

Process until it all comes together.

Divide into two 20cm sandwich tins and bake in a moderate oven for 20 to 25 minutes.

Leave to cool in tins.

Put whatever you want to in the middle and eat!