Homemade Christening Cake

I love a challenge! So a few weeks ago when my friend Susan asked me to make her baby Oscar's christening cake I was delighted. I hadn't made a proper big celebration cake before so couldn't wait to get started on it. It was a joint Christening between Oscar and baby Lauren so hence the pink and blue! I bought a set of flower cutters from a kitchen shop in Cork and must warn you that making sugar paste flowers is addictive! I bought a block of sugar paste and added food dye to colour it 6 different shades of pink and blue.I then watched Beverly Hill Cop II and made over one hundred little flowers. Best Friday night in ever.

I made the cake a few weeks ago but still have some of the left over flowers in a jar for when I'm making cupcakes or something! Very handy and I made some in light yellow that look like primroses. Someone's been bitten by the sugarcraft bug.

Two Tier Homemade Christening Cake

Based on the Wedding Cake recipe by Eric Lanlard in Delicious magazine.

What you will need: 3x  8" sandwich tins, 1x 12" cake tin

For the small cake:

260g butter, soft

260g sugar

4 eggs

375g self raising flour

2 tbsp milk

For the big cake:

1.2kg butter, soft

1.2kg sugar

18 eggs

1.2kg self raising flour

150ml milk

• Butter and flour the three sandwich tins. Butter and double line the large tin with baking paper.
• Preheat the oven to 160C. The method for both cakes is the same.
• Beat the butter until soft. Add the sugar and beat until light and fluffy.
• Gradually add the eggs, beating well between additions. Sift the flour and fold into the cake batter with a large spatula adding the milk as you go. Ensure the batter is combined well.
• Spoon the mixture into the prepared tins. Bake the small cakes for 20-25 mins and the large cake for 2 1/2 hours or until a skewer comes out clean. Leave to cool in the tin for 5 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to cool.

For the Icing:

625g butter, softened

850g icing sugar

125ml milk

2 tbsp vanilla essence

food colouring

Raspberry jam

6 x blocks of royal roll out icing

1 egg white mixed with enough icing sugar to form a thick 'glue'

• Beat the butter until soft. Add the sugar, milk and vanilla. beat for five minutes until light and fluffy.You can colour your buttercream like I did if you like
• Cut the large cake into three layers. Spread with the jam and sandwich together using the buttercream
• Next cover the entire top and sides of the assembled cakes with buttercream. This will make the roll out icing stick.
• Measure your cakes by running a piece of string from one side, over the top and down the other side. 
• Next roll out the icing into a large circle using your string to guide you. Place both cakes on their cake boards.
• Gently lay the icing over the cakes and smooth down using a ball of icing rolled in cling film.
•  Once both cakes are iced place on top of one another, I also used dowels in the base cake to help hold up the top cake.
• Next run the ribbon around the edges and seal with the icing glue.
• Use the icing glue to place all of the flowers or whatever decorations you want to use.

The beauty of using all of these tiny flowers was that I stuck them over any mistakes or bumps! It really was very easy to make but time consuming. I would set aside an afternoon to ice it! This cake recipe could also be used as a small wedding cake and decorated with fresh flowers. Beautiful!
Lilly x