Let us talk about a zebra cake, it’s a cake that a zebra and a zebra that’s a cake. It’s a cake that made love with a zebra and the result is the most light and fluffy vanilla cocoa sponge that you will ever see in your life. This cake is going to be spectacular, it takes a little bit of scooping and a little bit of mixing but we are going to end with the most beautiful marble zebra cake. Start by sifting through some plain flour into a bowl to create a very light and airy zebra cake batter.
Add sugar to the sifted flour a table of baking powder and nice you have your dry ingredients in there just mix them off so they are evenly combined. For the wet ingredients, we have milk, and oil, and the cake does not require any other fat, crack four eggs and add to the wet ingredients. Give them a little mix-up, add vanilla extract and give it a last whisk.
Straight into the center of the dry ingredients, add your wet ingredients, and slowly but surely, begin to work those wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and you should be left with a nice smooth batter. Stop stirring as soon as it is nicely incorporated this is a fantastic batter to use for a whole lot of different cakes and we are going to flavor it by adding a little bit of cocoa powder.
Split half the mix into one bowl then sift the cocoa powder into one of the bowls and mix it well until you have a nice, thick, and dark batter. So, you have a light batter and a dark batter, now we are going to start combing the two in a cake tin lined with parchment paper. Using two ice cream scoops, one for the vanilla and one for the chocolate mix now take a scoop of the chocolate mixture and pop it in the center of the baking pan.
Just work them through one after the other until you are done. Your zebra cake batter is now ready for the oven and we are going to bake until it’s nicely risen and when you insert a skewer it comes out clean. Once your cake is baked, remove it from the oven and let it cool and begin to cut the zebra cake. You can finish that off with a glaze if you are fancy but actually, this is a moist cake and a lovely thing to have.
Ingredients;
- 350g/ 12.3Oz(1¾ cups + 2 tbsp) self-raising flour
- 2 ½ tbsp cocoa powder
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 300g/ 10.6Oz (1½ cups + 2 tbsp) caster sugar
- 4 large free-range eggs, beaten
- 300ml sunflower oil
- 300ml milk
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
Instructions;
- Preheat the oven to 180ºC/350F/Gas Mark 4. Grease a deep 23cm/9″ round cake tin with a removable base and line with parchment paper.
- Sift the flour, and baking powder into a large bowl. Add the sugar and mix well.
- Place the wet ingredients into a measuring jug and whisk together. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour in the contents of the jug.
- Beat together by hand or with an electric hand-mixer until you have a smooth mixture.
- Take out ½ the mixture and place in a second bowl, sieve the cocoa powder into this mixture and mix until smooth.
- Now, put a tablespoon of the vanilla mix in the middle of the tin. Then, using a clean tablespoon, put a blob of the chocolate mix in the middle of the vanilla one.
- Keep doing this, alternating between vanilla and chocolate, each time you dollop a blob in, the whole mix will spread out on the base.
- By the time you have used up both of the cake mixes, they should have just reached the edge of the tin. 2 ice-creams scoops are great for doing this if you have them.
- Bake for 90 minutes, or until risen and firm to the touch.
- Remove from the oven and leave to cool before transferring to a wire rack until completely cool.
