Great British Bake Off has taken the world by storm- now we bake cupcakes give Mr Kipling the elbow! This Strawberry Gateau is part recipe and part blog… And this really is the original photo of the strawberry gateau that I made at school in my home economics class, aged about 14!
Cooking with Grandma…
My catering started at an early age when I started cooking with my grandma. Mum Chrissie tells me that she did bake cakes, but to be honest I can’t remember many, she wasn’t exactly Mrs Beeton when it came to baking. But she could roast a mean joint of beef!
My grandma came from a generation where you had to bake or you went hungry. She made bread and cakes and buns, and all the old fashioned stuff. When she baked I would go to her house and help, it was hard to see who made more mess, me or her!
I still use her recipes for cakes, Parkin and vinegar loaf – sounds vile but is the tastiest rich fruit cake you can make and I still make it most Christmases.
…and learning how to make food stretch!
I’m of a tender age when we did ‘Home Economics’ at school, which I did through choice and secured a neat and tidy grade A at O level. We had to make a full meal with different dishes, and answer all the nutritional aspects of what our meal included, and cost it out even down to the salt and pepper. I wonder how many people could do that today? Chrissie and I often sat at the end of a meal working out how much it cost to make per portion. Something like homemade meat and potato pie – which can be stretched across two days – costs little to make from scratch.
The Strawberry Gateau Background Story…
I did home economics all through school, and one strawberry gateau sticks in my mind. We were challenged to make it, I can’t remember why. This was in the days when almost everyone bought fruit and vegetables on the market. The ones on display at the front were perfect, unlike the ones that they gave you from the back! Chrissie had many an argument with the veg man in those days, for palming her off with dodgy stuff.
I can’t remember that supermarkets were particularly advanced back in the early 80’s. We certainly weren’t buying fresh food in them. Our meat came from a butchers, bread from a bakery etc. Marks and Spencer were selling food and ready meals at this point, but it was still relatively expensive and not mainstream like it is today. My friends mum worked in the food department at M&S. I’ll never forget her turning up to the cookery lesson with a great big punnet of perfect M&S strawberries at who knows what cost. The rest of us had what we could catch off the market!
When I buy strawberries in Marks and Spencers, I never see them without I think about THAT cake!
Strawberry Gateau made with grandma’s sponge recipe
You’ll find loads of different recipes for sponge cake. This is how grandma made it and it’s how I’ve always made it too. It’s really not that difficult to do, and a lot cheaper than buying a gateau in a shop!
Ingredients
- 4oz margarine
- 6oz sugar
- 2 eggs
- 8oz self raising flour
- 300ml double or whipping cream (medium sized carton)
- strawberries
- bar of plain or milk chocolate
Method
Cream the sugar and margarine together in a bowl.
Add the eggs and beat until a creamy mixture
Add the flour half at a time, sieve first to make your cake light and fluffy
If you want a chocolate cake, substitute 1oz of flour for drinking chocolate powder
Grease and line 2 x 7″ cake tins. Rub the tins with margarine/butter and then knock flour round the edge so it sticks to the fat. If you have any greaseproof paper put a circle in the bottom of the tin so that the cake comes out more easily.
Best baked in two tins for a more reliable result than trying to cook it in one tin. As grandma always said you don’t want it to go ‘sad’ in the middle.
When the cake/s have cooled, remove from the tins.
To decorate the cake
Grate the bar of chocolate into flakes using a cheese grater. Chop half of the strawberries up to fill the middle of the cake. Save the rest to decorate the top – leave them whole or in half as you please.
Whip the cream until it forms stiff peaks, sandwich the two cakes together with about 1/3 of the cream and include the small strawberry pieces.
Put cream around the edge of the cake with a knife, to cover all of the sponge. Then carefully roll in the flaked chocolate.
With the sides decorated, put the rest of the cream on top of the cake and decorate with the remaining strawberries. Sprinkle some remaining chocolate flakes over the top.
Why don’t you check out Trevors Foodservice – it’s the large, back-stage business that’s quietly feeding the Fylde Coast! They’re Blackpool’s number one wholesaler of chilled, frozen and ambient foods. And also sell cleaning materials, catering disposables and equipment.
The family firm was first established in Blackpool in 1962. It sells branded products and their Country Range, specially made for the 12-member buying group which Trevors is part of.
Enjoy!
(Don’t forget to keep it in the fridge – if there’s any left)
You might also enjoy…
- Fruit smoothie
- Pancakes – homemade or shop bought
- Strawberry Gateau
- Homemade rice pudding
- No cream ice cream
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