Raspberry Ruffle Cake

I love Raspberry's! And they are everywhere at the moment. So I have gone a little bit raspberry crazy lately. First off I made a Lemon Cake with Raspberry Syrup, but it was soooo good we finished it off before any pictures where taken! But I'm pretty sure I will be making it again, so I will make sure there will be time for pictures then.
My second raspberry cake is the Raspberry Ruffle Cake. I have been wanting to do a two toned layer cake with ruffle frosting for a while so the timing was perfect. It was the first time I did ruffles, but it did not turn out too bad in the end. Found doing the top of the cake most difficult.
Since my first cake on here did not have a recipe I thought I better include it this time.
So for this I made sure I used the very best vanilla sponge cake I knew. From the marvelous Sweetapolita. I have tried a lot of vanilla sponge cakes, and this one comes out perfect every time!

Raspberry Ruffle Cake
(cake adapted Sweetapolita. Find it here.)
Will make 4 layers, 18cm cake tins

The Sponge
5 large egg whites  (150 g)
180ml milk
2 1/4 teaspoons vanilla extract
315g flour
350g sugar
19.5g bakingpowder
170g butter at room temperature
30ml pureed raspberry's (or more if you like) - strain through a sieve to remove pips
1/2 teaspoon raspberry extract

Preheat oven to 180 degrees. Grease the sides and line your 18cm baking tins with grease proof paper. (I only have two, so had to clean them and reuse my baking tins.) Whisk the egg whites, 1/4 of the milk and the vanilla extract and set aside. In a separate mixing bowl combine all the dry ingredients. Add butter and the rest of the milk and mix for 1/2 minute. Scrape the sides of the bowl and then add the egg mixture in three separate batches. Mixing for 20 seconds after each addition. Divide the batter in into two and mix in the raspberry's and extract in one half. Mix until combined. Make sure not to overwork the batter. Then divide into four equal batches. Weigh the batches to get the same level on the finished sponges. Bake for 20-25 min, or until a skewer comes out clean. Remove from the oven and leave to cool slightly before removing the cakes from the tin to cool completely on a wire cooling rack.

Raspberry Curd
2 eggs + 2 egg yokes
120g sugar
80g butter
240g Raspberry's - strain through a sieve to remove pips

Put the eggs, egg yokes and sugar in a pan and whisk until smooth. Add the butter and raspberry juice and place over a medium low heat. Whisk until thickened, around 5 to 10 minutes. When you remove the spoon from the curd and it is coated, it is thick enough. Leave to cool. Cover it with clingfilm pressed directly on top of the curd to stop skin from forming.The curd will also thicken up a little bit while cooling.

Vanilla Frosting
(frosting adapted from here)
375g butter at room temperature
400g icing sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
20ml milk
20ml pureed raspberry's - strain through a sieve to remove pips

Beat the butter for 8 minutes. Add the icing sugar and vanilla extract. Beat for a further 6 minutes. Then divide the batter in 2 half's. Add the milk into one half and the raspberry puree into the other half. Mix until incorporated. If you use more than 20ml of raspberry's, remember to add more icing sugar.

Assembly
When the cake is cold, put one of the vanilla sponges on a cake stand and spread a dollop of the frosting over it. Then put one of the raspberry sponges on top and spread some curd on this one. Take the last vanilla sponge and place on top. Spread a layer of frosting evenly over it, top with the last raspberry sponge. Then spread evenly a thin layer of frosting all over the cake and cool until set. I try to leave it for 30 minutes. Then it is time to make the ruffles. But I will not try to explain how to do this. It will be a lot easier if you just watch this video.

Notes

• I only used one layer of Raspberry Curd. But the recipe above will make a lot and it would have been very nice to have had curd in all the layers.
• Left over curd will keep for a month in the freezer
• The cake was very sweet, so would have tasted delicious if I added some lemon to the curd for some acidity.