Lemon and Raspberry Rose Cake

The Cake

1. Preheat oven to 160˚C/310˚F.
2. Make the raspberry coulis and leave aside to cool while you get the cake batter going.
3. In a mixer, cream the butter and sugar until smooth.
4. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating for a minute before each addition. If your cake batters have a tendency to curdle, just add a tsp of flour with each egg. As there are only 4 eggs here, a tsp will suffice. Big batches (10 eggs and above) would probably do better with 1 tbsp.
5. Fold in the flour, scraping down the sides, until just combined.
6. Using a wooden spoon, add the curd and the coulis, stir gently, with a light hand, again until just combined. Over stirring cake mixtures will give you a stiffer and denser cake. Don’t worry about streaks.
7. Pour in the cake pan and bake for 60-70 minutes until the edges are just coming away or a skewer inserted comes out clean.
8. Leave to cool completely on a wire rack.

The Lemon Curd Buttercream Icing

1. Place the butter in a bowl and beat until light and fluff, about a minute.
2. Add the icing sugar and beat until thoroughly combined and smooth. You’ll end up with a very pale cream mix.
3. Add the water and lemon curd and beat lightly to mix.
4. Divide the icing into 2 equal parts and lightly colour one half with the red food colouring.

Icing the Lemon and Raspberry Rose Cake

1. As there is an inordinate amount of icing to be applied, we’ll only fill the cake with jam.
2. Slice the cake and fill it with the raspberry jam.
3. Using the offset spatula, apply a layer of thin icing all over, thin in with a teaspoon of water if it doesn’t glide easily. This first coat is called the crumb coat as it literally flattens/smooths the crumbs and acts as a glue for the next layer, whether it’s the piped roses, another layer of buttercream or fondant. Leave aside to crust slightly, 5 minutes in this case is enough as you want it to be tacky enough for the roses to cling on to.
4. Fit the nozzle to the icing bag.
5. Fill the icing bag one different spoonful at a time, i.e., start with the cream coloured icing, followed by the pink/red icing, back to cream and so on. Which goes first doesn’t matter.
6. Take a deep breath (!), chill out, and start piping large roses that will cover the whole height of the cake. You want to start in the middle and go right around in one direction.
7. As you do the next rose, allow the edge to overlap it the one next to it slightly. This will reduce the amount of “empty space” that will need filling up.
8. When you are done with the side, start the top, in the same fashion as before, doing the outer circle, overlapping slightly again. When you’ve made a circle, you’ll just have one rose in the middle to do.
9. Fill any gaps with small swirls of icing.