Lemon Coconut Battenburg Cake

(Recipe is my own. Techniques and method taken from Daring Bakers’ challenge website.)

Preheat oven to moderate 350°F.

Grease an 8×8″ square baking pan with butter.

Line pan with parchment paper, creating a divide in the middle with foil and parchment. Grease with flour and butter. Otherwise, grease and flour a Battenburg cake tin.

Whisk together the ground almonds, caster sugar, flour, and baking powder. Then combine with the yogurt, eggs, and vanilla in a large bowl. Beat together just until the ingredients are combined and the batter is smooth.

Divide batter in half. In the one half, stir in lemon juice and rind and combine. To the remaining half, add milk, coconut and red food coloring. Stir until color is distributed and ingredients are combined well.

Smooth both halves into each side of the divided pan, smoothing batter with a spatula, making sure batter is in each corner.

Bake for 25-30 minutess until the cake is well risen and a toothpick comes out clean when poked into the center. Leave to cool in the pan for a few minutes before turning out to cool thoroughly on a wire rack.

Once completely cool, trim the edges of the cake with a serrated knife. Cut each coloured sponge in half lengthwise so that you have 4 long cubed strips of sponge.

Neaten the strips and trim as necessary so that your checkered pattern is neat and even.

Gently heat the jam. Brush warmed jam onto the strips of cake to stick the cake together in a checkered pattern: one yellow next to one pink; on top of that, one pink next to one yellow.

Dust a flat surface with icing sugar then roll the chocolate clay in a rectangular shape, wide enough to cover the length of the cake and long enough to completely wrap it.

Brush the top of the cake with raspberry jam. Place the cake on the clay, jam side down. Brush the remaining 3 sides with jam.

Press the chcocolate clay around the cake, making sure the join is either neatly in one corner, or will be underneath the cake once turned over. Roll the cake tightly over so the clay covers it fully.

Carefully flip the cake over so that the seam is under the cake and score the top of the cake with the blunt end of a knife.

Neaten the ends of the cake and remove excess clay by trimming off covered cake on both ends to reveal a neat checkered pattern.