Coffee cake

Inspired by The Great British Bakeoff, I thought it was time I tackled Mary Berry's coffee Victoria sandwich.

It's easy peasy and tastes delicious.

Preheat oven to 180C / 160C fan and grease and line two tins.

Break four eggs into a bowl (I used duck eggs), then beat in 2 tsp instant coffee until dissolved.

Add 8oz softened butter, 8oz caster sugar, 8oz self raising flour and 2 tsp baking powder, then beat until thoroughly blended.

Add to tins then bake for about 25 minutes or until done. Cool on a wire rack.

Now the best bit - the buttercream icing! Blend 2oz softened butter, 6oz sifted icing sugar and 1 heaped tsp instant coffee dissolved in 1tbsp hot water.

Use some of the buttercream to sandwich the cake together then spread the rest on top. Don't forget to lick the bowl!

Eat and enjoy.

Brendan's coffee and walnut cake

I'm going to start this post with a warning.

This cake is delicious and addictive!

The first attempt to make a coffee cake was a total disaster. So I turned to the master...the lovely Brendan from The Great British Bakeoff.

I followed the recipe with no ad libbing and it turned out brilliantly. The only changes I made were to use a different tin size and a simple coffee buttercream.  Visit Brendan's website.

Cream together 175g butter with 175g sugar. Beat in three eggs. Add 175g self raising flour plus 1tsp baking powder.

Dissolve 3tsps coffee granules in 1. tbsp boiling water and add. Finally, add 65g chopped walnuts.

Bake until done at 180c. It took about 35 minutes using my tin.

To make the buttercream, use a ratio of half butter to icing sugar. Eg for 100g butter use 200g icing sugar. Add 3tsps coffee granules dissolved in 1tbsp boiling water to the buttercream.

Cover the cake with buttercream and decorate with walnuts.

Apparently the cake will keep for several days in a tin. Mine didn't last that long!