Lisa Faulkner's fantasy cake recipe

Lisa Faulkner's fantasy cake recipe is a deliciously summery treat made with strawberries or raspberries, or both! Lisa makes the cake all the time but she's altered it slightly over the years. The fruit she's used has varied, so feel free to use your favourite. It's lovely served warm as a dessert.

Ingredients

• 175g unsalted butter, softened, plus extra for greasing
• 150g caster sugar
• 150g self-raising flour, sifted
• 2 eggs
• 3 tbsp milk
• 100g ground almonds
• 1 tsp almond essence
• 400g strawberries, hulled and halved or quartered depending on size, or raspberries, or both
• icing sugar, for dusting

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 160C, gas 3 and grease and line a 23cm loose-bottomed cake tin.
2. Cream the butter and sugar together in a large mixing bowl until light and fluffy. Add the flour, eggs, milk, ground almonds and almond essence and mix well. Stir in the fruit, reserving a handful for decorating.
3. Pour the mixture into the cake tin and put the remaining handful of fruit on top of the cake.
4. Bake in the preheated oven for about 1-1.15 hours. To test if it is cooked, pierce the cake with a skewer - if it's clean when you pull it out the cake is cooked. If it's not, return the cake for another 5-10 minutes and check again.
   
5. Turn the cake out of the tin onto a wire rack to cool and dust with icing sugar. It's best served just as it's turning from warm to room temperature.