Fruity Flag Traybake for the Jubilee

The nation is awash with patriotism this weekend...it's great to see all the decorations, celebrations and everyone enjoying themselves!!

Even if you're not a Royalist, it really is an excuse for a get together and a party. On Friday afternoon it was great to have Jubilee picnic at work. There was celebratory food, egg and spoon and sack races and even a visit from Wenlock the Olympic mascot...a great time was had by all.

I made this Union Jack traybake for the occasion. I think quite a few people might have baked this one for the Jubilee as it's so simple but stunningly effective...and if you haven't seen it, it's on the cover of this month's BBC GoodFood Magazine! I just couldn't resist. It's a special recipe by Mary Berry for the Jubilee.

The sponge itself has the zest of two lemons along with Greek yoghurt and ground almonds. It was deliciously moist and light and when combined with the succulent berries and buttercream, it amounted to the perfect combination!

I hope you're enjoying the Jubilee celebrations...roll on Euro 2012 and the Olympics...more excuses to fly the flag and have a party! :-)

Ingredients
100g butter
175g self-raising flour
50g ground almonds
2tsp baking powder
4 large eggs
225g caster sugar
125ml full-fat Greek yogurt
Zest of 2 lemons

Buttercream

175g butter
350g icing sugar

300g raspberries
175g blueberries

 Preheat your oven to 180c/160c fan/gas 4. Then butter and line a 30 x 20cm tin. I only had a 21 x 28cm tin and it worked just as well, so if you've got something of a similar size, it would be fine to use that.

It really is simple to make, literally tip all the sponge ingredients into a large bowl and mix using smooth. It's best to use an electric hand whisk. The sponge then needs to be baked for 25-30 minutes until it is springy and a skewer comes out clean. You should then cool your cake on a wire rack out of the tin.

To decorate, whisk up the butter and icing sugar (preferable sifted) until lovely and fluffy. This can then be spread over the cold cake. For the crowning glory (sorry bad joke) top the cake with the raspberries and blueberries. Place a double row of raspberries from top to bottom and side to side, and then a single row diagonally out to each corner. Then just fill in the gaps with blueberries. Enjoy whilst singing 'God Save the Queen' :-)

Cake Club: New Year, New You

This Thursday was the second meeting of the Cakes 4 Fun cake club. Unfortunately the first rule of cake club is not to talk about cake club... however, as a baking blogger this could prove rather difficult!

The theme for this month was New Year, New You. I was a little short on time and imagination this month, so my healthy cake consisted of baking with blueberries and using low fat cream cheese! Some of the other cake clubbers were far more imaginative with cakes such as chocolate and courgette, as well as another chocolate cake which was butter and flour free!

My offering was a Blueberry Soured Cream Cake with Cheesecake Frosting, and you can find the recipe here on BBC GoodFood. I discovered a little too late that I didn't have the size of tin specified in the recipe, I only had a larger one. So I baked my cake for less time but it was rather shallow when it came out of the tin. I therefore made a second one exactly the same and sandwiched them together with lemon curd. In order to prevent my blueberries from sinking in the cake, I also washed and floured them... which seemed to work!

Overall, this wasn't a bad cake, a little sweet but certainly tasty! Next month's theme is 'Anything Goes... except Chocolate!'. So if you are around the London area and fancy joining us for cake, wine and chat, then check out the Cakes 4 Fun website.