So, I was washing the floor the other day and started thinking about my first blog. A mild panic swept over me so I abandoned that thought and started thinking about why I like my job. The constant supply of cake, trips to cupcake shops disguised as research and the fun of recreating normal things in cake sprang to mind but so did the parties that my clients have ordered the cakes for.

I don’t remember the presents, the games and exactly who made the cut to my parties, but I remember the cakes. Shop bought cake had an almost illegal status in our house so for every occasion we turned to our trusty cake book. Ninety-five percent of the cakes involved chocolate buttons and chocolate fingers and not a whole lot else, so that was fine with me. There was the hedgehog if you were in a rush, the cottage which was the most popular judging by the amount of cake mixture on the page and the bunny rabbit which nearly won a school friend the Home Ecc cake competition. But, the most amazing one, the one I always wanted, was the carousel cake. And one birthday my sister finally made it for me. I remember the pink roof, the animal biscuits on cocktail sticks and most of all my friend who started bawling when we tried to cut it. So, I thought I’d take a trip down memory lane and maybe inspire a couple of you to have a go too!

My nostalgic cake needed nostalgic recipes- here are the traditional ones!

Chocolate Victoria Sponge

175g margarine

175g sugar

3 eggs

150g self-raising flour

25g cocoa

1. Pre-heat the oven to 180˚C and line two 8” tins using baking parchment.
2. Beat the sugar and margarine together until pale.
3. Add the eggs and beat.
4. Fold in the flour and cocoa.
5. Divide the mixture between the two tins and bake for about 30 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.
6. Turn out onto a wire rack, remove the paper leave to cool.

Chocolate Butter Icing

25g cocoa

3 tablespoons boiling water

175g butter

300g icing sugar

1. Dissolve the cocoa in the boiling water to make a paste.
2. Beat the butter in an electric mixer until soft.
3. Add the icing sugar and beat until the mixture becomes pale.
4. Mix in the cocoa paste.

Carousel Cake

2 packets of chocolate finger biscuits

1 Flake bar

1 packet of animal shaped cookies

1 packet chocolate buttons

royal icing

cocktail sticks

1. Place your cooled cake on a large flat plate (put a small blob of icing in the centre of the plate to stop your cake sliding).
2. Using the butter icing, sandwich together the two layers, spreading the remaining icing over the top and sides of your cake.
3. Place your chocolate biscuits neatly along the sides over your cake.
4. Push the Flake bar into the centre of the cake.
5. Stick cocktail sticks into six of the animal cookies and arrange them around the cake, close to the finger biscuits.
6. Put the remaining cookies around the Flake in the centre.
7. To make the paper canopy draw an 8” circle on a piece of card and divide it into 16 segments.
8. Cut a scalloped edge outside of the circle, using the segments as a guide.
9. Cut along one line up to the centre and glue down one segment.
10. Fit a piping with the nozzle and fill with royal icing.
11. Pipe some icing to top of the Flake bar and place the canopy on top.
12. Fix a button to each scallop of the canopy using royal icing.