Recipe: Iced fancies
Makes about 20
- butter for greasing
- 6 medium eggs separated
- 250g golden caster sugar
- 350g ground almonds
- 50g flaked almonds chopped
- 1½ tsp baking powder
TO DECORATE
- 250g ready-to-roll icing plain or coloured
- a little pastel food colouring optional
- 300g apricot jam
- hundreds and thousands
- edible decorations of
- your choice
- Preheat the oven to 200C/180C fan/gas 6. Butter and line a 30cm x 22cm traybake tin or equivalent with baking paper, and butter the paper as well. Whisk the egg whites until stiff in a large bowl (an electric hand whisk is good for this).
- In another large bowl, whisk the egg yolks and sugar together – the mixture should not be too thick. Fold the whites into the egg yolk mixture in two or three goes, followed by the ground and flaked almonds and baking powder. Spoon the mixture into the prepared tin, smooth the surface and bake for 25-30 minutes until golden and shrinking from the sides of the tin. A skewer inserted at the centre should come out clean. Run a knife around the edge of the cake and leave it to cool. When cool, turn the cake out on to a board and peel off the paper.
- Roll out the icing thinly and tint it a pretty shade with food colouring, if using (if wished, tint one half pink and the other blue). Gently warm the jam in a small saucepan to loosen it, then press it through a sieve. Brush the top of the cake with some of the jam, lay the icing on top and press in place. Trim and cut the cake into small squares.
- Brush the sides of each fancy with jam and sprinkle with hundreds and thousands. Decorate the tops to your liking and set aside in a cool place for an hour. The cakes will keep well in a covered container for several days.
First published in YOU, Mail on Sunday
