The ever popular Battenburg Cake is a bake that I made yonks ago, in fact, before I was Glutarama. I’ve been meaning to remake some of my old bakes for two reasons, firstly they need re-photographing, some of my photos from the early days are awful to say the least. Secondly, I’m missing making them, my time seems to be taken up creating new recipes and pushing myself to be more creative and more inclusive to everyone’s dietary needs. I’m thinking it’s time I revisit some old posts and inject a bit of life into them.
Making my first ever Battenburg was hilarious in the making and constructing! I didn’t have the baking equipment necessary to bake the different colour sponges so made a make-shift cake tin, as you can see it wasn’t a disaster, but neither was it a huge success! I am now the proud owner of a Silverwood Cake Tin that can be made up to create all sorts of fabulous shapes and sizes, well, squares and rectangles at least. If you do consider buying one, I would also recommend getting the extra inserts you tin will go from many shape options to loads of shape options!
I recall on my first attempt that the sponge wasn’t quite square and I ended up making a bit of a hidden jigsaw puzzle in the centre of the finished cake! Do you know what? It really doesn’t matter too much if that is the case (I just made sure I got the dodgy slice at teatime!)
Vegan Battenburg Cake Option
I’ve made this Battenburg recipe time and time again and am now confident to make it vegan too, in fact the images are my most recent gluten free, dairy free and vegan Battenburg Cake, just to prove it can be done. I simply switch the eggs for flaxseed eggs but to be fair, three substitute eggs is normally chia overload so if making it vegan make two flaxseed eggs as directed below.
How to make a flax egg
to make 1 flax egg you need the following ingredients:
– 1tbsp ground flax seed
– 3tbsp water
– 1tsp psyllium husk (optional but does add elasticity to baking)
Simply add all ingredients to a glass and stir before measuring out the other recipe ingredients, by the time you come to use your ‘egg’ mixture it will have thickened to a frog-spawn consistency (thicker if you added psyllium husk)
Then just add to your baking as you would an egg. For 2 eggs double the ingredients but note that recipes that require more than two eggs may fail due to lack of support in the structure.
In hindsight I may have been a bit heavy-handed with the food colouring this time but hey, what’s a neon Battenburg between friends right? …. ACTUALLY, this seems to be a reoccurring issue because my Gluten Free Angel Cake was’t low colour either (remember Rebecca; less is more, less is more)
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One last thing; Battenburg Cake Disaster
Don’t laugh, this was my first ever attempt at making Battenburg, It can be done without a Silverwood Cake Tin, just expect to be a bit more of a puzzle solver if you choose to do it this way!
This is what it looked like after 35 mins of cooking, as you can see it’s sunken overcooked (or caramelised as I like to say) and the pink won the battle for territory!
I also love the fact that you can see my scrapbook in the background, I used a supermarket magazine recipe originally (I totally forget which) but over time scribbled my own notes and adjustments until I was happy with the gluten free version – that scrapbook is still somewhere in the house…I think?
Easy Gluten Free Battenburg Cake Recipe
If you try and like the recipe I would be eternally grateful if you popped back and commented leaving a star rating as this will tell search engines that this recipe is worth checking out and others will get to find it in searches.
This Battenburg Cake will knock your socks off, a gluten free, dairy free, egg free traditional chequer board cake. It'll be the showstopper for any tea table.
- 200 g caster sugar
- 200 g dairy free butter I use Flora Plant Butter
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 200 g self raising gluten free flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 2 eggs for vegan version I used 2 tbsp ground flaxseed mixed with 100ml water
- few drops pink colouring
- few drops yellow colouring
- 2 tsp Jam apricot works really well
- 500 g marzipan white or yellow to your preference
Cream together the butter and sugar
Change to a whisk and add the vanilla extract and the eggs (or flaxseed egg replacement)
Fold in sifted flour (try sifting from a height, it adds air to the mixture)
Take 50% of the mixture (I work it out to be approx 340g) add pink colouring and add to your prepared tin
The remaining 50% you can colour to your liking with the yellow colouring, then add to the prepared tin.
Bake at 180°C | 160°C fan | 350°F | Gas 4 for 25-30 mins
Once cooked remove and allow to cool completely
Roll out your marzipan to approx 30x40cm, brush this with some of the jam
Trim your cakes down to size and brush each top with jam.
Build your chequered Battenburg Cake on top of the rolled marzipan
Lift the sides of the marzipan and smooth to the edges of the sponge making sure the marzipan sticks firmly, use jam as glue.
Turn the Battenburg over so the sealed side is now hidden at the bottom of the cake. Trim the edges to achieve that unmistakable Battenburg trademark look.
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Lovely r3cipe, but I didnt see where you had to add baking powder and accidently missed it. Oops!
Oops thanks for the heads up Julia I shall hop over after this and amend, you get a gold editor star!
Ok, so it’s not finished cooking yet but I am excited! My daughter will be 1 in two days and has an egg allergy. I was SO gutted when I found out because I’ve always loved baking and wanted to make her the perfect birthday cake, and most of the egg recipes I’ve tried in the past have either been a complete flop, or really heavy and/or banana-y. I have nothing against banana but heavy cake is so not me. I’d never heard of making a flax egg before! I haven’t made it vegan; I used butter (don’t shun me!) but it looks like a game-changer. As I say, it’s not even cooked yet but the batter is delicious and it’s currently rising well!! Thank you!
Kathryn, your kind words have literally made my day. Having a food blog can sometimes feel like shouting a recipe off the top of a mountain and hoping for an echo of feedback….it doesn’t happen often, especially with lockdown (I jest). Thank you so much for your kind words and the warm fuzzy feeling I now have at the thought of your little one eating this bake xx
I *need* to try this, Battenburg was always my favourite when I was a kid ❤️
Aw bless you, it’s a childhood fav of mine too x
What’s wrong with pudding???? It’s funny, I sometimes say pudding and sometimes say dessert – it depends what it is, really. Like apple crumble and custard is definitely pudding, whereas say a chocolate mousse would be dessert. Loving this Battenburg cake, which I would happily have for pudding or dessert (or maybe both!) and somewhat jealous of your fancy cake tin!! Thanks for linking up with #CookBlogShare :-) Eb x
Seem to have sparked a debat on the matter of pudding, glad you agree with me, trouble is Brett would say we’re having Christmas Pudding…for dessert…Just to make his point….not sure its grounds for divorce though haha ;-)
You’re so funny! I can imagine you shouting, “Pudding, pudding, pudding!” and pulling your tongue haha. You’re so childish. 100% my kind of girl! I would have loved Brett’s birthday dinner. Fillet steak is always my birthday treat.
You can’t beat a beautiful steak with all the trimmings xxx
That Silverwood Cake tin looks amazing. Did you get all the fancy gadgets I dream of when you had your kitchen done? I’m just going to move in with you! I love the fact you’re sharing your fails as well as your successes. We’re only human! Love the fact you’ve made this baby vegan. It looks scrummy!!! I’d definitely have a slice or 5 with my cup of tea :) Thanks for joining in with #FreeFromFridays.
The cake tin was a present from my mum but I bought the additional pieces so I can make lots of diddy cakes and all wonderful shapes and sizes! ….that said…there was a lot of shiny new kitchenalia bought when we had the extension, not all have been used yet…I’ll get there! xxx
Love a Battenberg….. It’s such a classic. I made and blogged one abut 3 years ago….. it was amazing. But I also made it without the proper equipment and had to make a barrier down the middle of the tin to separate the mixes (out of cardboard covered with foil). I still haven’t treated myself to a divider tin yet!
Really impressed with your vegan version. Looks delicious. Not sure I could make one without eggs though. I’m not clever enough xx
I’m sure you could make a vegan one Kate! :-) there’s something about a Battenburg that takes me back to my childhood xxx
Battenburg is a firm family favourite here! This one looks and sounds delicious. Thank you for sharing with #CookBlogShare x
Wow Rebecca, this looks so good – plus gluten free & egg free too! I love battenberg cake – esecially the marzipan! It’s been on my to make list for ages but not having one of the fancy cake tins it’s never been made. I’d imagined separating a brownie pan with tinfoil – but from your post I’m guessing that’s a lot hearder than it sounds!
Angela x
PS, we use the word pudding at home too! ;-)
Hehe, pudding! I love marzipan, so yummy! If you do crack it without a fancy tin let me know how you did it x
I don’t think I’ve had a battenburg cake for years! Yours looks lovely with a great texture too.
It was a lovely moist cake, had the last slice on Thursday (made Tuesday) it was still lovely and moist, going to have to make another one soon….just for research purposes of course!!! ;-)
I LOVE Battenburg and haven’t had it for absolutely ages! I’ve never been brave enough to attempt to make it though and will have to check out that amazing cake tin you mention – sounds fantastic.
Thank you Mandy, this has proven to be a very popular post, seems you and I are not the only one’s who love a bit of Battenburg xxx
Ooh, a vegan Battenburg…. must make this! It looks so yummy!
#cooblogshare
Thank you. It simply HAD to work! No way was I making Battenburg for the family and not be able to have a slice too!
Very impressive! When I made it I didn’t have that snazzy looking cake tin (but I want one)…and one colour was definitely bigger than the other…but that just meant trimmings for me to eat! I love the fact you’ve made it egg free as well. Brilliant xx
Thank you, and yes, it is a snazzy tin…loving it! xx
Yum – Finally a battenburg I can eat! I HAVE to have a go at this – my sofa duvet day buddy miss E says it looks very cool! When you do redo your recipes hop over and add them to the recipefefurb linky on my website – would love to see them! I am doing it as a way of making myself sort out the old ones!
Ooh good thinking Batman, will do. Thought of you..me first, then you when I made this…I was NOT missing out on Battenburg…my fav xxx