LIKE many people I was inducted into cake making at the apron of my mum.

Some of my most treasured memories are of scooping fairy cake mixture into little paper bun cases and licking the wooden spoon afterwards.

The satisfaction of eating the misshapen creations for tea afterwards was always a joy!

Today, hard though it may be, we live in a world where even cakes, apparently, are ruled by fashion.

Whether you choose an American cupcake or Red Velvet cake, this says as much about you as the car you drive or the shoes you wear.

So, I’m standing firm against the vagaries of cake cultism, letting the baking band-wagon roll on. Let’s celebrate the unsurpassed joys of the humble classic Victoria sandwich this week.

Yes, you know the Victoria sandwich launched a thousand afternoon teas and church fetes, and you also know it is the subject of hotly-contested competition every year in the home-baking tent at the Keighley Show!

I blame the quintessentially Victorian figure of Mrs Beeton for this – she laid out the classic recipe for the Victorian sponge cake in her Household Management book.

Her cake was made from equal quantities of eggs, butter, sugar and flour. You must follow this, and do what the eggs tell you regarding weights – that’s the fun of it.

The accurate weighing has a wonderful rightness about it, a simplicity reflecting in the cake itself – nothing fancy, nothing elaborate – and yet it’s one of the finest cakes ever to grace our side plates.

The Victoria sandwich is also a Women’s Institute icon, a potent symbol of baking over the last hundred years.

This cake must be buttery and light and always filled with a layer of homemade raspberry jam and its golden surface must always be dusted with a fine coating of caster sugar.

And it must always be eaten after singing Jerusalem at the end of the gathering with a cup of tea.

This classic cake was based on the English Pound Cake which I have written about in a previous column.

The Pound Cake also needs equal weights of flour and eggs for structure building, having that perfect sweeten balance coming from the sugar and butter, making this cake moist and edible for a few days after baking.

So lastly, let’s salute Queen Vic who liked her cakes with her afternoon tea.

Put the kettle on and cut yourself a lovely thick slice, sit down in a comfy chair and enjoy a quiet moment to yourself with your beautiful creation.

It might not be as good as your mum’s, but it will taste grand and everyone will want a slice!