Battenberg cake
See this recipe step by step

Battenberg cake

Sarah Cook's traditional Battenberg cake is a delicious project for an afternoon in the kitchen

Difficulty and servings

Easy

Makes 2 cakes, each cuts into 10 slices

Preparation and cooking times

Preparation time

Prep 2 hrs

Cook time

Cook 1 hr

Freezable

Method

  1. Heat oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4 and line the base and sides of a 20cm square tin with baking parchment (the easiest way is to cross 2 x 20cm-long strips over the base). To make the almond sponge, put the butter, sugar, flour, ground almonds, baking powder, eggs, vanilla and almond extract in a large bowl. Beat with an electric whisk until the mix comes together smoothly. Scrape into the tin, spreading to the corners, and bake for 25-30 mins - when you poke in a skewer, it should come out clean. Cool in the tin for 10 mins, then transfer to a wire rack to finish cooling while you make the second sponge.
  2. For the pink sponge, line the tin as above. Mix all the ingredients together as above, but don't add the almond extract. Fold in some pink food colouring. Then scrape it all into the tin and bake as before. Cool.
  3. To assemble, heat the jam in a small pan until runny, then sieve. Barely trim two opposite edges from the almond sponge, then well trim a third edge. Roughly measure the height of the sponge, then cutting from the well-trimmed edge, use a ruler to help you cut 4 slices each the same width as the sponge height. Discard or nibble leftover sponge. Repeat with pink cake.
  4. Take 2 x almond slices and 2 x pink slices and trim so they are all the same length. Roll out one marzipan block on a surface lightly dusted with icing sugar to just over 20cm wide, then keep rolling lengthways until the marzipan is roughly 0.5cm thick. Brush with apricot jam, then lay a pink and an almond slice side by side at one end of the marzipan, brushing jam in between to stick sponges, and leaving 4cm clear marzipan at the end. Brush more jam on top of the sponges, then sandwich remaining 2 slices on top, alternating colours to give a checkerboard effect. Trim the marzipan to the length of the cakes.
  5. Carefully lift up the marzipan and smooth over the cake with your hands, but leave a small marzipan fold along the bottom edge before you stick it to the first side. Trim opposite side to match size of fold, then crimp edges using fingers and thumb (or, more simply, press with prongs of fork). If you like, mark the 10 slices using the prongs of a fork.
  6. Assemble second Battenberg and keep in an airtight box or well wrapped in cling film for up to 3 days. Can be frozen for up to a month.
Try

Bake it different

Swap almond extract for zest of 2 lemons and 1 tbsp lemon juice in first sponge. Swap pink colouring for zest 1 orange and 1 tbsp orange juice in second sponge (add orange food colouring if you like). Assemble with lemon curd.

PER SERVING

524 kcalories, protein 7g, carbohydrate 71g, fat 25 g, saturated fat 10g, fibre 2g, sugar 61g, salt 0.5 g

Recipe from Good Food magazine, March 2011.

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Latest comments and suggestions

Results 1-20

  • Binder photo Andie GF

    2011-02-07 22:35:47.30049

    Andie GF commented on this recipe

    Oooh! Can't wait to try this one - loved Battenberg cake when I was little. Any chance Good Food that you could do Chocolate Bourbon Biscuits as well?

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  • Binder photo foggyamh

    2011-02-16 12:18:52.081018

    foggyamh rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    I used natural food colouring, and the pink turned out darker, but it didn't spoil the look. Tricky rolling the marzipan round the cake perfectly, but that was the only problem I had. 10/10 for taste. My friends were very impressed :)

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  • Binder photo jilly

    2011-02-16 16:44:03.926854

    jilly rated and commented on this recipe

    3 stars

    I made this it tasted lovely but hard to get it looking exact, it does make alot of battenberg

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  • Binder photo Fi

    2011-02-21 12:10:05.710158

    Fi commented on this recipe

    It is fiddly to try and make it look perfect, If one cake ends up deeper than the other it won't look quite right, unless you start trimming the cake too much which is a pain and will result in lots of crumbs. Rest assured that no matter how it looks it will taste fabulous. Conclusion? If you want a pretty Battenburg, go and buy Mr Kipling, but if you want one that actually tastes great? Use this recipe and make your own!

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  • Binder photo Yasmine

    2011-02-23 16:16:34.675424

    Yasmine rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    amazing!! tastes exactly like the ones I used to have when i was a kid. definitely they best recipe for battenbergs Ive seen.

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  • Binder photo Yasmine

    2011-02-23 16:16:39.642727

    Yasmine commented on this recipe

    amazing!! tastes exactly like the ones I used to have when i was a kid. definitely they best recipe for battenbergs Ive seen.

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  • Binder photo babe

    2011-03-01 13:53:24.423662

    babe rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    Thank you for an excellent magazine. Made the battenberg cake, easy to make and assemble - results were excellent and tasted wonderful.

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  • Binder photo Angelofthenorth

    2011-03-20 04:30:25.685808

    Angelofthenorth commented on this recipe

    I would use good old-fashioned red food colouring, rather than pink, because I, like many others, was left with an albino cake. I also used a jar of apricot cake glaze -not a wise move. Use a good quality sieved jam otherwise the cake will not stick together.

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  • Binder photo KagsMiskit

    2011-04-05 16:05:59.082473

    KagsMiskit commented on this recipe

    I would love to try this, it reminds me of my Ma. Problem is, I really dislike marzipan, can I use fondant/plastic icing to coat?

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  • Binder photo Jasmine

    2011-04-24 23:46:00.238646

    Jasmine rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    I made this for the Easter Vigil after party. Everyone raved about it. We certainly didn't take any home!

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  • Binder photo proofofthepudding

    2011-06-04 15:45:51.024961

    proofofthepudding rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    Two words - Absolutely Delicious! I used 1/2 teaspoon of RED food colouring instead of the pink, it turned out Perfectly Cake-Candy Pink! I will be trying the lemon/orange variation next time, just because it also sounds great!

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  • Binder photo proofofthepudding

    2011-06-04 15:52:21.953927

    proofofthepudding commented on this recipe

    Second suggestion - re. the Apricot jam thing - a certain well known brand "H" make a "No Bits" Apricot jam as well as their regular one, saves time & effort as you don't need to strain/sieve it, once warmed through and stirred it was perfectly smooth and ideal for the cake. (I used a bowl in the microwave not a pan on stove, reduces chance of burning).

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  • Binder photo spotter

    2011-06-06 11:10:06.379112

    spotter commented on this recipe

    I have baked battenburg twice now, and on both occasions the pink is non existent, it is all the same colour, what am I doing wrong, it was really pink when it went in the oven

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  • Binder photo spotter

    2011-06-06 11:12:56.282355

    spotter commented on this recipe

    No it was exactly the same method and recipe as above

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  • Binder photo Ella <3

    2011-07-12 09:58:57.866159

    Ella <3 rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    Perfect-It only needs one word it turned out great and I used 1/4tsp red food colouring it came out perfect gorgeous pink colour really proud of this cake-Family loved so if your planning on using it go for it-I also couldn't fingd the large quantity of marzipan so used the recipe on this site for it and it also turned out fabulous!!!!! Thumbs up.

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  • Binder photo shelleybobbins

    2011-08-20 11:58:03.322022

    shelleybobbins commented on this recipe

    Turned out perfectly, made the orange scented marzipan and looks very pretty!

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  • Binder photo Falooloo

    2011-08-22 18:35:33.554619

    Falooloo commented on this recipe

    After watching The Great British Bake Off I was excited about the challenge of making this cake. I really enjoyed making it. The cakes couldn't have been simpler! The 'building' of the cake was fiddly but really fun, and the marzipan worked well. It went down very well with my family and I will definitely be making it again.

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  • Binder photo rjb725

    2011-08-23 00:01:10.854683

    rjb725 commented on this recipe

    Made this today and it's turned out really well. For some reason, the pink cake rose more than the yellow cake but I just trimmed it off. The only tin I had was slightly bigger than 20cm so this recipe actually made three cakes and definitely didn't need a kilo of marzipan. Also, it was all pretty time consuming but I expected that and have a great result so thanks!

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  • Binder photo diane

    2011-10-09 10:48:37.772725

    diane commented on this recipe

    it tastes great but i am dissapointed in pink cake which looked postivley not pink i used asda pink feeod coluring perhaps i should use paste instead for a better colour. Any way the assemby was fidly and not as neat as i would have liked and i have got loads of left overs which the husband and kids are nibbling. Anyway i will try again untill i get it right. had fun doing it

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  • Binder photo Gem91

    2011-10-21 11:42:38.896451

    Gem91 commented on this recipe

    If I make Jane Hornby's "Easy vanilla marzipan", will this cover both battenberg cakes?

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Difficulty and servings

Easy

Makes 2 cakes, each cuts into 10 slices

Preparation and cooking times

Preparation time

Prep 2 hrs

Cook time

Cook 1 hr

Freezable

Ingredients

FOR ALMOND SPONGE

FOR PINK SPONGE

  • 1 x ingredients for almond sponge
  • pink food colouring , we used ½ tsp Squires rose food paste

TO ASSEMBLE

  • 200g apricot jam
  • 2 x 500g blocks white marzipan
  • little icing sugar , for dusting
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PER SERVING

524 kcalories, protein 7g, carbohydrate 71g, fat 25 g, saturated fat 10g, fibre 2g, sugar 61g, salt 0.5 g

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