Special Mother’s Day Cake

Happy mother’s day to all the beautiful and special mums out there!

Whether you hold your children in your arms or hearts, you are loved and special.

Well here it is, mother’s day! I could hide myself away under a duvet or I could get up and feel proud to be Elena’s mother. I strangely find myself in a good mood. I didn’t expect this. But I am feeling so very lucky and proud to be Elena’s mother and so proud of her where ever she may be. I have been stomping around the house all morning demanding breakfast in bed and coffee etc, do you think I got them? Nope! But I did get a beautiful pink Camellia from Elena and Damian and a very special mug (I love my mugs).

For the last two months I have obsessed over the fact that I gained weight. I have been desperately trying to get my body back to what it was before. But I realised something in the last two days, my body has changed. I am proud of my body. I am proud of every extra pound, of every curve and every stretch mark. And I now love my body. Everything about it is a reminder of who I am, Elena’s mother.

There are many things I have to be thankful for… My wonderful mother and my beyond amazing sister, my partner D and his loving family. On this day my mother deserves my special gratitude and love. She has offered me constant support and love and is an amazing woman, mother and grandmother.

To all the mothers, grandmothers and great grandmothers,

Happy mother’s day!

SPECIAL MOTHER’S DAY CAKE

This is essentially a victoria sponge cake with buttercream frosting and topped with Macarons. All week I knew what I wanted my cake to look like. I saw a cake on a blog called Raspberri cupcakes. It looked so pretty and I knew I wanted to make it for my first mother’s day. So this idea comes from there, but made with my own recipe. I made this with a 4 layers of sponge and each layer is a different shade, ranging from natural to bright pink. Obviously you don’t have to do this.

2 quantities of my Victoria sponge mix
2 quantities of my buttercream frosting mix
my French Almond Macarons
some raspberry jam
sprinkles (optional)

THE HOW

Pre heat the oven to 180 C/160 C fan oven. Grease and line 2 18/20cm sandwich tins.

If you would like the layers to be different colours, divide each quantity of mixture into 2 (so you have 4 equal bowls of batter). Before putting the batter into the baking tins, drop a few drops of red food colouring into each portion of batter. Mix well. Then add more drops of food colouring into 3 portions, increasing the amount for different shades of batter.

Once you have your 4 shades of batter, pop two portions into the prepared tins. And cook for 20-25 minutes or until and golden in colour. Repeat this for the last two portions. Leave to cool completely.

While the cakes are cooling, make the buttercream frosting. Add some food colouring to this also if you would like.

To assemble the cake, place a small blob of frosting on a plate or serving dish. Put the darkest pink layer of cake on top of the frosting blob and press down (this stops the cake from moving around). Put a thin layer of frosting on the top and smooth out. Don’t worry, it doesn’t needs to be neat. Add a layer of jam.

Repeat this until you have all the layers together, going from darkest colour on the bottom to palest on the top. Then take some frosting and roughly smooth it onto the sides and top with a palette knife, filling all the crevices and imperfections.

This takes a few minutes and is messy! Smooth the edges and top so there is only a thin layer of frosting. Put the cake in the fridge for the frosting to harden (15 minutes). This allows you to add the final layer of frosting very smoothly and neatly.

To finish, add sprinkles to the remaining frosting and mix. Smooth the final layer of frosting to the sides and top of the cake. A Long flat palate knife is great for this as on the top layer you can level out the frosting flat to hide any curving of the cake.

Top with macarons and eat!