Tuesday 21 October 2014

The Best Vanilla Cake with White Chocolate and Cinnamon Buttercream Icing



A heart warming request from grandsons for 'a cake baked by Granny' for their school lunch boxes saw me delve into my 'Brown Book' for this recipe. An easy-to-make one bowl cake it was a regular in my children's lunch boxes more years ago than I care to say here!

The recipe means a great deal to me bringing back wonderful memories of our late friend, Val, who passed it on to me. Those memories include the wonderful late night suppers that were a Thursday night Table Tennis tradition, the resulting 'tired eyes' on Fridays at school, and celebrating a Grand Final win with too much Southern Comfort! Ouch!

I make this as a large slab cake for general use ie lunch boxes, or in two round cake tins if making a celebration cake with layers. The choice is yours!

The cake also keeps well in the freezer if you are needing to plan ahead. If by chance you have cake left over for any reason it is fabulous in a great trifle!


The Best Vanilla Cake


3 cups Self Raising flour
4 tablespoons custard powder
250 gms soft butter
1 3/4 cups sugar
4 large eggs (I use 700gm size)
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract


Method
Sift the flour and custard powder into your large mixer bowl. Add the sugar, butter, eggs, milk and vanilla.

Beat together on a medium speed for 10 minutes.



For slab cake line a roasting pan with baking paper. For round cakes use two sponge tins or two 21 cm springform pans.

Bake in a moderate oven (I do 165C in my fan forced oven) for approximately 30 minutes or until golden on top and a skewer pulls out clean.

Remove from the oven and cool on a cake rack. Carefully turn out and ice.


White Chocolate and Cinnamon Butter Cream Icing


3 cups icing sugar
250 gms soft butter cut into cubes
1/2 cup white chocolate buttons
3 tablespoons milk
Generous pinch of cinnamon

Method
Sift the icing sugar, add the soft butter and beat together slowly for a minute or so to blend the icing sugar and butter together.

Warning: Turn the dial to high - like I did (in a brain fade moment!) - will result in a BIG mess! See what I mean in the picture below!




Melt the white chocolate buttons in a ceramic bowl using short blasts in the microwave to do this. Stir gently to a paste and add one tablespoon of warmed milk (blood temperature). Stir until thoroughly combined. 

Add to the icing sugar mixture with the remaining cold milk. Beat on high until a rich and fluffy buttercream has formed. Add the cinnamon and beat thoroughly. 

Ice your cake generously. Sprinkle over with coconut.






Enjoy!

Cheers!

Marian




8 comments:

  1. Looks divine!!! Will have to try it soon, thanks for the post! Lily

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    1. Thanks, Lily! It's also one of the easiest cakes you will ever bake! Thank you for dropping in to Apricot Tart!

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  2. Yum, the icing itself looks good enough to eat!

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  3. Fran, the icing is definitely very more-ish!!!

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  4. What a beautiful cake Marian - it looks divine! I think food that brings beautiful memories is the best kind xx

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    Replies
    1. Thanks M! I agree about those food memories! Thanks so much for dropping in!

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