Square peg in a round Battenberg...

A couple of months ago when I was on a photo shoot with work, the very lovely food stylist mentioned how to make a round battenberg. In my head I couldn't quite figure out if it would work or not so when the boyfriend mentioned he loved battenberg I thought I would save the trick until his birthday and do it as a surprise.

His birthday is tomorrow but as we always have cake at work I made it late last night (and had a sugar high from eating the left over marzipan and couldn't sleep!) to bring in today to celebrate. The basic recipe was based on one by the Hairy Bikers but I added some ground almonds and then made it round instead of rectangular.

It was a big hit with everyone at work and kicked the shop brought cake's butt!

Round Battenburg Cake

Ingredients

For the cake:

• 175g softened butter, plus extra for greasing

• 175g golden caster sugar

• 3 free-range eggs

• 175g self-raising flour

• 50g ground almonds

• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract (or use almond extract if you love almonds)

• red food colouring

• yellow food colouring

• 2-4 tbsp warm water

For the covering:

• 6 tbsp apricot jam

• 500g ready-made marzipan

• 2–3 tbsp icing sugar, for rolling.

Method

Preheat the oven to 190C/375F/Gas 5.

Grease two 20cm/8in round tin with butter and line with baking parchment.

Put the butter, sugar, eggs, flour, ground almonds and vanilla in a food processor and pulse until well combined (you can use a hand mixer instead).

If the batter is a little stiff add a tbsp of warm water at time until you are happy with the consistency.

Divide the batter in half and put one half in a different clean bowl.

Add a few drops of red food colouring to one bowl and fold it into the batter until it is well blended.

Add a few drops of yellow food colouring to the other bowl and fold it into the batter until it is well blended.

Spoon the cake batters into each one of the prepared tins and smooth the surface with the back of a spoon.

Bake in the centre of the oven for about 25 minutes, or until the sponges have risen.

Cool in the tin for five minutes, then remove each sponge from the tin and turn them out onto a wire rack. If the sponges have risen unevenly, press the surface gently until level. Leave until completely cold.

To assemble the cake, take two pastry cutters, one smaller than the cake and the other smaller still. Cut out a circle from each cake using the larger cutter so you get a large doughnut shape and a smaller circle, on the smaller circle use the small cutter so you get a medium doughnut shape and small circle.

Warm the apricot jam in a saucepan then press through a fine sieve.

Now take the large pink doughnut and put the medium yellow doughnut in the middle, then put the pink small circle in the middle of that. Brush all over with apricot jam.

Place a third of the marzipan on a surface dusted with icing sugar and roll into a circle to fit the size of the cake. It should be about 5mm thick.

Place the marzipan circle on top of the first layer of the cake and brush with apricot jam.

Layer on the yellow pink doughnut and put the medium pink doughnut in the middle, then put the yellow small circle in the middle. Brush all over with apricot jam including down the sides of the entire cake.

Place a the rest of the marzipan on a surface dusted with icing sugar and roll into a circle to fit the over the cake. It should be about 5mm thick.

Using the rolling pin to gather up the rolled marzipan place it carefully over the top of the cake to create a smooth covering. Gently smooth the marzipan down the sides of the cake, pressing it gently onto the surface of the sponges.

Trim any marzipan overlapping the edges to create a neat edge.