Coffee and Walnut Cake

This cake has always been my dad's favourite - if I ever say I'm going to bake he will always ask for this without fail! It is a lovely classic; light coffee sponge with creamy buttercream and crunchy walnuts and the great thing about it is you can adjust the amount of coffee to suit your taste. This uses the same technique as my Victoria Sponge recipe, where you weigh the eggs first and then weigh each ingredient to the same weight, so its very easy to scale up or down.

Ingredients:

Cake:

3 eggs
Caster sugar
Margarine
Self raising flour
2-4 tbsp homemade coffee extract (see below)
Handful of chopped walnuts - optional but delicious

Coffee Buttercream

50g unsalted butter, softened
150g icing sugar
2tbsp homemade coffee extract
8 whole walnuts, to decorate

Method:

1. First up, make your coffee extract. I do this by dissolving 3 heaped tsps instant coffee in 100ml boiling water then leave until cold - don't use this mixture warm as it will curdle your cake batter! 

2. Preheat the oven to 180 °C. Grease and line two shallow cake tins. Weigh the eggs in their shells. Make a note of what they weigh as this is measurement you'll need for all the other cake ingredients. Weigh your sugar, margarine and flour to this weight, and beat the eggs in a separate bowl or jug.

3. Using either an electric mixture, or by hand, cream together the sugar and margarine in a large bowl until light and fluffy.

4. Mix in the beaten eggs and coffee extract a little at a time, adding a spoonful of flour with each addition to stop the mixture curdling. Use 2 tbsp coffee extract for light hint of coffee, 3 tbsp for a bit more of a hit, and 4tbsp if you like a really deep, rich flavour. 

5. Gently fold the chopped walnuts and remaining flour into the mixture, once its all incorporated pour the mixture into the tins.

6. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until the top of the sponge is springy on top and a skewer comes out clean when inserted. Transfer to a wire rack until completely cool.

7. To make the buttercream beat the butter until it is really soft, then add the icing sugar a spoonful at a time, beating well after each addition. When you've added about half of the icing sugar, add the coffee extract, a spoonful at a time. Like the cake, you can add as much or as little coffee as you'd like here, but bear in mind that the more you add the more likely it is you'll need to add more icing sugar as well to keep the buttercream soft and spreadable. 

8. Fill and top the cake with buttercream, decorating with the walnuts and anything else you'd like. Grated white chocolate always goes nicely on a coffee cake, as does a little sifted cocoa powder. Cut into slices and enjoy! 

You can also use this recipe to make coffee cupcakes, just spoon into cupcake cases and reduce cooking time to 15-20 minutes.