Floral Birthday Cake

Grease and line an 8in round, deep cake tin with baking parchment and pre heat your oven to 150°C (130°C fan, gas mark 2).

Cream the butter and the sugar until they its light and fluffy. Add the vanilla essence and mix until smooth.

In another bowl measure the flours and baking powder.

Whisk all the eggs in a bowl and gradually beat into the sugar and butter mixture. Add a tablespoon of flour at a time to prevent the mixture from curdling. Fold in the remaining flour and the water until smooth.

Spread the mixture in the cake tin and bake for 45 minutes. Check to see if the cake is done by pressing a finger gently on the top. If it bounces back it is ready, if not it will leave an indent and needs a little longer. Allow to cool in the tin for 15 minutes, then turn out and allow to cool.

To make the buttercream beat softened butter with sifted icing sugar, until light and creamy adding 1 tsp hot water if necessary. Store in an airtight container.

To make the flowers, choose three colours of sugar paste icing and roll out the first batch. Dust a decorator’s pallet with a little icing sugar ready to give the flowers the curved look (or crumple up some foil or cling film to make shallow containers to dry the flowers in).

We used two style flower cutters for this cake - daisy and blossom. Start by cutting out the largest flower. Place it in the well of the pallet and press it down with your finger, being careful not to tear the icing. Repeat till you have made the desired number of large flowers then use a brush dampened with clear alcohol to wet the centre of each flower.

Next cut out a smaller flower and place it on the centre of the large flower. The easiest way to do this accurately is to use plunger cutters and press the flower out directly where you want it on the large flower. This step can be repeated so that you have three layers of icing petals to create each flower. Leave to dry.

To decorate the cake cover cake with the buttercream.

Position your cake on the cake board and cover the whole cake and board in one go in pale blue icing. Smooth to a perfect finish. Position the cake near the back of the board to make room for the flowers at the front.

Cut out the number you are celebrating from white icing and position centrally using clear alcohol.

Mix up some white royal icing so that it is soft and use an artist’s paint brush to add a little under each flower as you position it. Make sure that you mix and match the colours, sizes and shapes of flowers as you decorate the cake. Place some up the side of the cake in clusters to create the overall effect.

To complete the look position a matching blue ribbon around the cake board. Secure with stick glue for instant adhesion. Use a pearl pin to keep the ends of the ribbon in place at the back.