How to bake a patterned cake

This pink and white inside surprise cake came about by accident when I was trying to make a checkerboard cake. I had not baked a checkerboard cake before and as part of my research I had watched a few videos but I thought I could reproduce a checkerboard cake in a different way. In this video tutorial I will show you how to bake a patterned cake.

My checkerboard cake did not work out but the way I did the cake still produced a lovely pattern inside. I used pink and white for this particular design but you can use any colours you like. This cake batter is quite runny so you will need an extra pair of hands to help you spoon the mixture into the piping bags.

In this three layer vanilla cake I will be using the seeds of one vanilla pod. If you cannot find them I would say use about 3-4 teaspoons of pure vanilla extract.

Ingredients

• 500grams plain flour
• 310g caster sugar
• 2 tablespoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 250 ml milk
• 2 1/2 teaspoons lemon juice
• 125ml veg oil
• pink food colouring
• 3 large eggs
• seeds of one vanilla pod

Method

• Pre-heat the oven to 180 Celsius
• Butter and line, with baking paper, three 20cm round cake tins.
• Put the lemon juice into the milk, stir and set aside for at least 5 minutes
• Put all dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl
• Add the eggs, oil and vanilla pod seeds into the milk mixture and whisk together.
• Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix until smooth
• Put half the mixture into a separate bowl and colour it pink
• Put your pink batter in one piping bag fitted with a round tip and put the white batter in a separate piping bag with a round tip too
• Pipe the batter into two of the cake tins making a ring of pink and then alternate with the white cake batter until the cake tin is full.
• In the third cake tin pipe an outer ring of the white batter and alternate with the pink until the cake tin is full
• Bake for 20-25 minutes until lightly brown
• Remove the cakes from the oven and leave them in the tins for 5 minutes and then remove them from the tin and peel off the baking paper and leave them to cool completely.
• Make some the best vanilla butter cream icing

To assemble the cakes

• Assemble the cakes together by placing one of the cakes with the pink outer ring upside down on a serving plate and put some butter cream on it and spread to the edges. Put the one with the vanilla outer ring on top and spread more butter icing. Finally top it with the one with the pink icing and and spread more butter icing and then butter the sides too and decorate with sprinkles or anything else you like.
• Cut into the cake and reveal the lovely inside.

Enjoy!