Festive Mandarin Cake


Mandarin Cake

Mandarins are one of the flavours of Christmas! This delicious dessert is sure to become a family favourite.

Preparation time: 30min
Cooking time: 20min
Serves: 10-12 

Ingredients

For the filling: 

  • 2 x 298g can of Princes Mandarin Segments with Juice, drained
  • 200g butter, at room temperature
  • 400g icing sugar, plus extra, for sprinkling
  • 2tsp finely grated orange zest
  • 3tbsp orange juice

For the cake:

  • A little vegetable oil, for greasing
  • 225g self-raising flour
  • 1tsp baking powder
  • Pinch of salt
  • 225g caster sugar
  • 225g soft margarine, at room temperature
  • 4 large eggs
  • 3tbsp milk
  • 1tsp vanilla extract
  • 1tsp finely grated orange zest

For the decoration:

  • Edible stars

To Make

  1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/fan oven 160°C/Gas Mark 4. Lightly grease three 20cm sandwich tins with vegetable oil and line the bases with greaseproof paper. (Or use two tins and cook in batches).
  2. Sift the flour, baking powder and salt into a mixing bowl. Add the sugar, margarine, unbeaten eggs, milk, vanilla extract and orange zest. Use a wooden spoon to beat the mixture together for 1-2min until smooth and creamy. Share the mixture between the prepared tins and level the tops.
  3. Bake for 18-20min. The cakes should be golden brown, and when touched lightly the tops should spring back into place. Cool in the tins for a few min, then remove the cakes and place on a wire rack. Peel away the lining paper and leave until completely cold.
  4. For the filling, beat together the butter, icing sugar, orange zest and orange juice until light and creamy. Spoon about one third of this into a piping bag fitted with a star nozzle and set aside, along with eight mandarin segments.
  5. Spread half the remaining butter icing over one cake and arrange half the remaining mandarin segments over it. Sandwich the second cake on top and decorate with the leftover icing and mandarin segments. Place the third cake on top. Pipe swirls of butter icing around the edge and decorate with the reserved mandarin segments and edible stars.
  6. Serve, sprinkled with icing sugar.

Sarah Proctor

I've worked on a variety of regional newspapers and national magazines. My Weekly and Your Best Ever Christmas are fantastic, warm-hearted brands with an amazing, talented team. I'm a sub-editor and particularly love working on cookery, fiction and advice pages - I feel I should know all the secrets of eternal life, health and happiness by now, but hey, we all need that regular reminder!