SCRUMMY LIQUORICE ALLSORT CAKE

Steps:

• Preheat the oven to 180 C / 350 F / gas mark 4. Grease two round 18 cm sandwich tins.
• Beat the butter and caster sugar together until light and creamy. Carefully add one egg and stir in until the mixture is smooth. Do the same with the second egg.
• Sieve the flour and lemon rind into the mixture, add the milk and beat everything until smooth. Then divide the mixture between the two cake tins and gently smooth the tops.
• Cook for about 20 minutes until the cakes feel springy when they are lightly pressed with a finger. Leave them to cool for a short while in the tins and then turn them out onto a wire cooling rack.
• Buttercream - Place the softened butter into a bowl and sieve the icing sugar. Add the milk and beat everything together until smooth. When the cakes are cool place one onto a plate and then spread the buttercream onto this one cake. Then put the other cake on top.
• Sprinkle evenly some icing sugar across your work surface and rolling pin. Knead the yellow or pink ready to roll icing whilst in the packet and then place it onto this surface. Sprinkle some icing sugar onto the top of this (not too much) and gently rub into it with the palm of your hand - this avoids "spotting".
• Roll out the icing using the rolling pin until it looks like it would completely cover the top of the cake and the sides - you may want to hover the icing over the cakes just to make sure. Once you are happy with the size, brush the top of the cake and sides with some warm water (don't use too much water overwise it will wreck it)
• Place the yellow/pink rolled icing over the cake. Gently press down at the sides so that the sides are covered too and make sure that the top is stuck down by gently pressing on it. Using a knife cut any remaining loose icing around the edges at the bottom so that it looks more neat and circular.
• Grab the black ready to roll icing and use the same technique as in step 6 (yellow/pink icing). Once you have sprinkled icing sugar on it and rolled it out a bit, you need to make a circle out of the black. To do this find something in your kitchen which is circular and that if you hold it on top of the same looks the right size in proportion to the cake to make a liquorice allsort. Press this shape gently down onto the black icing and cut out this circle - alternately you could cut out the circle free hand however this may be harder if you are not the best at cooking/art!
• Spread a tiny amount of warm water on the back of the black icing and then immediately stick it down in the middle of the cake. Leave to set for a bit so that the icing sticks down but this doesn't need to be for long. If you wish you can decorate the cake around the edges with liquorice allsorts in whatever pattern you wish. Then enjoy!!!