STRAWBERRY MERINGUE LAYER CAKE

STRAWBERRY MERINGUE LAYER CAKE

This cake brings back many memories for me of Belfast in the 1980's, more so than any other food. It was what I chose every time I went into "The Upper Crust" in Lombard Street, along with a cup of coffee. Their coffee was virtually undrinkable but all the food was freshly baked on the premises every morning resulting in long queues out the door onto the street every lunchtime.
For years the recipe eluded me but I finally found it in Nigella Lawson's "Forever Summer".
The first time I baked the cake I was surprised to find that the sponge is quite dense and moist, almost like a pudding sponge rather than a lighter cake sponge. The denseness is necessary though in order to support the meringue surrounding it.

Ingredients

125g plain flour
25g cornflour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
100g very soft unsalted butter
300g caster sugar
4 eggs
2 teaspoons of pure vanilla extract
2 tablespoons of milk
50g flaked almonds
375ml double cream
250g strawberries

Preheat oven to 200 degrees centigrade.

Line, butter and flour two 22cm springform tins.

Weigh out the flour, cornflour and baking powder into a bowl.
Cream the butter and 100g of the caster sugar in another bowl until light and fluffy.
Separate the eggs and beat the yolks into the butter and sugar, saving the whites to whisk later.
Gently fold in the weighed-out dry ingredients, add the vanilla, then sir in the milk to thin the batter.
Divide the mixture between the two prepared springform tins.
Whisk the egg whites until soft peaks form, then gradually add the remaining 200g caster sugar.
Spread a layer of meringue on top of the sponge batter in each tin and sprinkle the almonds evenly over.

Bake for 30-35 mins, by which time the top of the almond-scattered meringues will be a dark gold.

Let the cakes cool in their tins, then spring them open at the last minute when you are ready to assemble the cake.

Whip the double cream then hull and slice the strawberries.
Invert one of the cakes on to a plate so that the sponge is uppermost.
Pile on the cream and stud with the strawberries.
Place the second cake on top, meringue upwards and press down gently to secure it.