Strawberries & Cream Pinata Cake

I love this time of year because not only is it almost my birthday (which I do look forward to, until I remember how old I am going to be!), the weather is warming up and the nights are longer, but British strawberries are back and in season!!! I do find it amazing that we can now buy them all year round, via importing them from warmer climates, but you cannot beat a juicy, sweet British grown strawberry (in my opinion!).

I wanted to make a Strawberry Pinata cake last summer but I just never found the time! Therefore, when I was asked if I fancied creating a Wimbledon inspired bake to enter into a Ralph Lauren Wimbledon Bake Off competition, I decided that now was the time to make such a cake.  It is an easy cake to make – as per almost all my cake recipes, I used my victoria sponge method and then cut out rounds in the sponge layers, assembled with jam and fresh vanilla flavoured, whipped double cream, and then filled with strawberries which were hidden inside until the cake is cut into.

Here is how I made this delicious and summery Strawberries & Cream Pinata Cake

Strawberries & Cream Pinata Cake

2015-06-10 23:12:44

Serves 10

a scrummy strawberry and cream cake with a hidden surprise filling of fresh strawberries.

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Cook Time

25 min

Cook Time

25 min

Ingredients

1. 300g unsalted butter
2. 300g sugar
3. 6 eggs
4. 2 tsp vanilla essence
5. 300g self raising flour
6. 400ml double cream
7. 1-2 tsp vanilla essence
8. 1 tbsp icing sugar
9. strawberry jam
10. 300g (approx) strawberries

Instructions

1. pre heat the oven to 180oC / 160oC (fan)
2. grease and line 3 x 8 inch baking tins
3. cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy - about 5 mins
4. add the eggs, the vanilla essence and a tbsp of flour and beat well for a few minutes
5. Lightly fold in the flour
6. divide the batter between the cake tins and cook in the oven for approx 25 mins until golden brown, risen and cooked all the way through
7. leave to cool
8. when you are ready to assemble your cake, whip the cream with the vanilla essence and icing sugar until just thick as you want it to have some movement
9. cut each of the 3 sponges in half to make 6 rounds
10. using a large scone cutter, cut out rounds from the 4 middle sponges.
11. The bottom sponge must not be cut at all, whereas the top sponge you need to carefully remove the same size round, but only half as thick so it does not make a whole just an indent
12. Then starting with the bottom (complete) sponge, place onto your cake stand/plate and place the scone cutter in the middle and add jam around the circumference, remove the scone cutter and cover the jam with some cream
13. then top with each of the 4 sponges which have wholes in the middle, covering each layer with jam and cream
14. once the 5th layer has been added and covered, fill with as many strawberries (green bits removed) as you can and then cover with the 6th remaining sponge layer
15. Then top the final sponge with some more cream and decorate with some more strawberries
16. keep in the fridge, unless serving right away
17. although it will keep for a day or two, it will be best on its first day

By Jenny Paulin

Mummy Mishaps http://www.mummymishaps.co.uk/

This cake , I think, is very pretty, extremely tasty and sums up June and the Wimbledon season perfectly. This would be a great cake for garden parties and BBQ’s this summer served alongside a glass of Pimms maybe.

I actually used some sugar free sugar in this recipe. NatVia contains zero calories and is perfect for those of us trying to lose weight/live a healthier lifestyle, but who still crave some cake from time to time.  

Natvia is alittle crunchier to bake with than caster or demerara sugar, because when creaming it with butter it does not blend in aswell. Once cooked, I did notice that my sponges were a little more golden brown compared to a sponge made with regualr caster sugar (I made 2 of the sponges with Natvia Baking sugar and one with caster sugar). Also one other noteable difference is that the sponges made with Natvia were dryer, less crumbly which made cutting the rounds out more easy!

(The crumbly pieces were made using the caster sugar)

I did worry that this would make them taste dry, but actually although not as soft, they tasted fine with the cream and jam, and no nasty sweetener after taste either.  I used some of the NatVia Icing in the cream and again it did not affect the taste or consistency and I certainly felt a little more virtuous after eating a slice of this cake 🙂

I was sent some NatVia for the purpose of a review

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