Auntie Vi's Custard Cake

This week is a first - Four Fig's first ever guest blog.  Ryan's custard cake is amazing, or I should say Auntie Vi's cake.  I feel pleased as punch that he agreed to share the recipe on Four Figs.  It's incredible how simple the ingredients and techniques are, and yet when it comes out of the oven the cake needs nothing other than a plate and fork to serve.  It's rich with flavour and moist, with just enough crisp on the "crust" to keep it interesting.  I hope you enjoy it as much as I liked "taste testing" it...

It is not every day that you get asked to be a guest blogger on one of Canberra's premier food blogs.

Jeffie asked me to tell the story behind my Auntie Vi's Custard cake.  This is a recipe that has been handed down through the family from my grandmother to my mother and then to me.

I first had this cake when I was a small boy at my auntie's place in Perth. Every Wednesday my cousins, aunts, and uncles would gather at my Auntie's place for lunch. Everyone would bring something to eat. My Auntie Vi would always bring this beautifully moist custard cake. Inevitably it was one of the first dishes to disappear.

While the days at my Auntie's place are long gone, the memory of the cake lives on. I recently inherited my grandmother's Sunbeam Mixmaster from 1949. It is one of the first Sunbeam Mixmaster's ever made and works like the day it rolled off the production line in Botany Bay. Making Aunty Vi's cake with my Grandmother's mixer takes me to a very happy place.

This is a super simple recipe that is so easy you can even make it with one arm. [Literally, he broke his elbow and still managed to make this with one hand!]

Auntie Vi's Cake

Ingredients
- 300g butter
- 2 cup sugar
- 4 eggs
- 4 heaped tablespoons custard powder
- 2 cup self-raising flour
- 1 cup milk - just over

Set your oven to 150° Celcius.  Line the base of a 24 cm spring-form cake tin with baking paper.

Cream the butter and the sugar together in a mixer (or with hand-held beaters) until it is light and fluffy.

Combine the eggs with the butter and sugar.

In a separate bowl, sift the self-raising flour with the custard powder.

Add half the sifted self rising flour and custard powder to the butter, eggs and sugar, using your mixer to combine. Pour in half the milk until all ingredients are combined, then add the last half of the flour and, finally, the last of the milk.  Mix until completely combined.

Pour the cake batter into a 24 cm cake tin and bake in the oven for approximately 60 min until the top is golden brown.  Test with a skewer - it will come out clean when it's ready.  Allow to cool slightly before removing to a plate to serve.

Enjoy.