This recipe accompanies Anna Trapido’s Scoff column in TGIFood, published here

This recipe was originally in Uitgesoekte Resepte, by SAVF, Potgietersrus Branch, 1964 which was quoted in Saam/Share (Errieda du Toit, Struik Lifestyle, 2019) and then slightly fiddled with again by me in 2020.

Ingredients for biscuit/cake layers

Makes 1 x 20cm six layers plus a crumble topping

450 g cake flour

10 ml baking powder

Pinch salt

200 g white sugar

225 g butter (softened)

2 eggs (beaten)

Sift together the flour, baking powder, salt and sugar.

Using fingertips or a food processor rub the butter into the flour mixture. Add the eggs and mix to form a soft dough.

Divide the dough into 6 pieces of approximately 160g each. Cover or wrap and set the dough aside to rest for 30 minutes.  

Preheat the oven to 180℃.

Roll out the dough and use 20cm cake pans to make perfect circles. Set aside all the offcuts to be the crumbled top layer.

Spray the bases of the pans with non-stick cooking spray and line the base of each tin with baking paper. Put the dough circles into the pan and press down evenly with the bottom of a glass.

Bake each circle until lightly browned and cooked through (8-10 minutes). Cool the circles in the pans and then lift out carefully and set aside. Repeat until all the layers have been cooked. The layers should have a crisp biscuit-like texture.

Bake the offcuts and when cool crumble them to make a snow topping.

Ingredients for custard filling

10 ml vanilla essence (or a scraped out vanilla pod if you are feeling super posh)

500 ml milk

6 egg yolks

100 g castor sugar

30 g cake flour

Put milk in a saucepan. If you are using vanilla seeds add them now. Bring to the boil. Set aside to cool slightly.

Combine egg yolks, sugar and flour. Beat well until thick and pale.

Off the heat, slowly add the warm milk to the yolk, sugar and flour mixture. Beat after each addition. Put the mixture back onto the heat and stir continuously until the mixture thickens. Take care not to have the heat too high or you will make scrambled eggs. Once thick take off the heat and add vanilla essence (if using).

Now would be the moment to add any fancy flavourings (makataan preserve, chopped nuts, cardamom, orange blossom water, once I used boerenmeisjes apricots soaked in brandy which was wonderful) if you are feeling creative.

Cover the thickened custard filling and set aside to cool.

Assembling the cake – clever people don’t seem to need to but I do this inside a cake ring to stabilise my structure).

Put the cooled custard into a piping bag with a 1 cm nozzle.

Place the first cake circle on a cake board or plate. Pipe a spiral of custard filling starting in the centre and ending about ½ cm from the edge.

Place the second layer on top of the first and repeat until all the circles and most of the filling has been used up.

Spread a very thin layer of the remaining custard on the top layer and sprinkle the crumbled offcuts on top (sometimes I do the sides as well).

Put the cake in the fridge overnight so that the structure and flavour can set. DM/TGIFood

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