-
Cream together the caster sugar and margarine in a large bowl until creamy.
-
Beat the eggs in a bowl or jug and weigh the flour into another bowl. Add 1/3 of the flour into the creamed margarine, beat in with a wooden spoon, add 1/3 off the beaten egg and beat again, repeat until all of the flour and eggs are worked in.
-
Add the vanilla essence and give a final good beating.
-
Grease and line two 8inch round cake pans, spoon the cake mixture equally between the two pans and then place in an oven preheated to gas mark 5/190c. Allow to bake for 25-30 Mins, if the top starts to go too dark before the inside has cooked (check by inserting a skewer into the middle of the cakes, if it doesn't come out clean the cake isn't cooked), cover in tin foil and check every 5 Mins until middle is cooked.
-
Remove from the oven, allow to cool slightly in the pans, then turn out onto a cooling rack, allow the cakes to go fully cold before adding the filling.
-
There are two ways you could do the filling, I prefer using fresh cream but you could also do butter cream. To start spread the jam over the bottom of one of the cakes (the bottoms of the cakes will be sandwiched together)
-
For the fresh cream version, pour double cream and icing sugar into a bowl and whisk until thick and it doesn't run when the bowl is tilted, spread over the top of the jam and sandwich the second cake on top OR if you are doing the butter cream version, place the margarine and icing sugar in a bowl and cream together using an electric whisk or fork, spread over the top of the jam and sandwich second cake on top.
Keep the cake in the fridge if you opted for the fresh cream version.
