Victoria Sponge

I've never made a Victoria Sponge (what, I hear you gasp, never made a Victoria Sponge, calls herself a baker!), hard to fathom I know. So last week I asked a friend what sort of cake she would like me to bring over for afternoon tea and sure enough she went for the classic. A couple of evenings before I would be making it I had knitting group and asked advice from one of the members who is almost a professional baker (you are really!). She had some great tips. If you don't have a recipe for the tin size you have just weigh your eggs and use the same weight of flour, butter and sugar. When you put the batter in the tins make it higher around the edges so that you get a more even sponge. Just before you put the tins in the oven bang them against a work surface to get rid of any air bubbles. And you can never cream the butter and sugar too much. All great tips all of which I used apart from the egg one as I was using a Nigella recipe from How to Be a Domestic Goddess and had all the right tins. Firstly, I made sure that my butter was very soft. This, I have realised is one of the most important things when it comes to baking a cake and ensuring it's lightness. I used my stand mixer, I think I have the measure of it now, added the butter and sugar and just left it to do it's work for about 10 minutes until the mixture was almost white. Then I took over and added the eggs and flour etc by hand, popped the batter in the tins (making sure that the sides were higher) and into the oven. I know that you shouldn't open the oven during baking but I find it very difficult not to especially as my oven has a tendency to be on the hot side. But lately I have managed to keep myself away from the door and now I know why you shouldn't disturb a cake in it's cooking and rising. I have also noticed that there is a certain smell when the cake is just about done and I can tell when it has gone over and may be on the way to burning (am i unique in this or is that the same for everyone who bakes?) I really need to get myself a proper cake tester, I just use a knife at the moment and it does leave an unsightly slit which is usually covered with icing so it doesn't really matter but you know....right tools for the job and all that. Must get myself onto Lakeland. Once out of the oven I negotiated the hairy task of removing them from the tins without breaking them and managed it (just about, a hot sponge is a bit too flexible!). Now as I was transporting the cake to my friends I decided to bring all the component parts and assemble it at my destination rather than risk Vitoria Mulch. Once I arrived (the table set in the garden for afternoon tea) I whipped the cream, spread the jam, sandwiched the sponges and sieved icing sugar atop (thus disguising the knife-testing slit), voila. But then the controversy began, whipped cream wasn't the right thing it should be butter cream (or so I was told). So my first foray into Victoria Sponge making wasn't quite the classic but we made do (there's always the next time). Unfortunately as we sliced the cake the heavens opened, however we were very British about it and stuck it out until it became torrential and the umbrella started leaking! But we did eat the cake outside before the rain and very nice it was too.