Bløtkake (Eli’s recipe)
My friend gave me this recipe for a Norwegian cake called "Bløtkake" (which literally means "moist cake") as I wanted a celebration cake for one of our cake club sessions. It's a light sponge, moistened with fruit juice, layered with fresh fruit and whipped cream, and covered in marzipan. This is the type of cake you'll see at any celebration from birthdays to weddings (along with lots of other cakes, for big celebrations there will usually be a cake table with lots of cakes brought by the participants rather than just one cake).
It's delicious, really light and so tasty. And the sponge mix works really well for other cakes too.
Sponge recipe:
5 eggs
150g caster sugar
150g plain flour
1.5 teaspoons baking powder
1 tablespoon vanilla sugar (if you haven't got vanilla sugar, just use a teaspoon of vanilla extract instead)
To decorate:
Fresh berries or other fruit
Whipped cream
Marzipan
Whisk together eggs and sugar, whisking for a very long time until greatly increased in volume and very frothy - about 10 minutes! Sift together flour, baking powder and vanilla sugar and gently fold into the eggs. Pour into prepared tin (approx 7"-8", lined with baking parchment).
Bake at 150oC for around 25 minutes until golden brown on top (varies between ovens - it took 50 minutes in my conventional oven). After about 5 minutes of cooling in the tin invert onto rack to cool completely.
Now comes the bit which makes this a moist and yummy cake...
While the cake is baking, cut up some strawberries and stirred in some sugar to let them macerate. When the sponge is cooled, slice in half to make two layers. Drizzle the juice from the strawberries over the two layers to moisten the sponge. Then layer the sponge with a good helping of fresh berries and whipped cream. Then cover the whole cake in whipped cream. The traditional recipe would then cover the whole cake in a layer of marzipan as well. I usually stop at the cream and cover in berries.
