Ingredients

Method

For the sponge cake:
• 1½ cups castor sugar
• 4 large eggs
• 1 cup oil
• 2 t vanilla essence or extract
• 1 cup milk
• 2½ cups flour
• 1 T baking powder
• 1 t salt
For the cake coating:
• 1 x 290 g can apricot jam
• 3 – 4 cups boiling water
• food colouring(s) of your choice
• desiccated coconut, to coat the cake squares
For the decorations:
• whipped cream
• Caramel Treat
• sugar flowers
• chocolate flake
• canned fruit
• Jelly (1 packet of jelly to 1 cup of water and let it set)

Method

Ingredients

1. Preheat the oven to 180 °C. Spray a deep baking tray with cooking spray or grease with butter and sprinkle with a little flour.

SPONGE CAKE:
2.  Add the castor sugar and eggs to a mixing bowl and beat for about 4 – 5 minutes. Start adding the oil little by little to the egg mixture while beating.

3. Next add the vanilla essence, milk, flour, baking powder and salt. Stir all the ingredients until well combined. Give the batter one last beat to make sure that everything at the bottom of the bowl has combined with the mixture.

4. Pour the mixture into the prepared baking tray. Swipe a toothpick through the batter to get rid of any bubbles that may have formed.

5. Bake for 30 minutes in the preheated oven. Test the cake with a toothpick to make sure that it’s baked completely – if pressed into the centre, the toothpick must come out clean.

6. Let the cake cool for 5 minutes in the baking tray, then turn it out on a cooling rack to cool completely. Once cool, cut off the edges of the cake neatly and cut the cake into small squares.

COATING:
7. In a mixing bowl whisk the apricot jam and boiling water together. Divide the mixture into three separate mixing bowls. Add a few drops of food colouring to each bowl. (You can use three different colours, or only one colour if you prefer.)

8. Dip a cake square into a jam mixture and then coat with coconut. Continue until all the cake has been dipped and coated.

DECORATION:
9. With a piping bag, pipe the cream onto the cakes and decorate as desired.

Extracted with permission from Fatima Sydow - Cape Malay Cooking My story, my heritage. It’s published by Human & Rousseau.

Find more cake recipes here.