Mary Berry’s Victoria sponge traybake is an all-in-one sponge baked in a 30 x 23cm tin and cut into 27 slices. Each one is split and filled with jam-glazed strawberries, whipped cream and crème fraîche. It bakes at 180°C/160°C fan/Gas 4 for 35 minutes.
The recipe isn’t strictly Berry’s. It appears in her Absolute Favourites (2015) as Lucy’s Strawberry Slices, by Lucy Young, who has worked with her for 25 years. Berry introduces it as a twist on the classic Victoria sandwich.
The cutting is what turns a traybake into something that looks bought. Trim the edges straight first, then cut lengthways into three strips and across into nine. Each oblong is split horizontally and filled like a sandwich.
Mary Berry Victoria Sponge Traybake
Course: Mary BerryCuisine: BritishDifficulty: Easy27
servings30
minutes35
minutes225
kcalA Victoria sandwich rebuilt as 27 small filled slices, from Berry’s 2015 book. One tin of sponge, no sandwich tins to line and no cake to turn out whole, which is why it works for a crowd.
Ingredients
- For the sponge:
225 g (8 oz) butter, softened, or baking spread, plus extra for greasing
4 eggs
225 g (8 oz) caster sugar
300 g (11 oz) self-raising flour
2 level tsp baking powder
4 tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
- For the filling:
2 tbsp strawberry jam
1 tsp lemon juice
300 g (11 oz) small fresh strawberries, hulled and cut in half
300 ml (10 fl oz) double cream, whipped
200 ml (7 fl oz) full-fat crème fraîche
icing sugar, for dusting
Directions
- Preheat:You will need a 30 × 23cm (12 × 9in) traybake tin. Preheat the oven to 180°C/160°C fan/Gas 4, then grease the tin with butter or baking spread and line the base and sides with greased baking paper.
- Mix:Measure all the cake ingredients into a large bowl and beat well for about 2 minutes until well blended. Turn the mixture into the prepared tin and level the top.
- Bake:Bake in the oven for 35 minutes or until the cake has shrunk from the sides of the tin and springs back when pressed in the centre with your fingertips. Leave to cool in the tin.
- Cut:Remove the cake from the tin and trim the edges so that they are perfectly straight. Cut the cake lengthways into three strips, then cut across each strip to give nine 7 × 3cm (2¾ × 1½in) oblong slices. Cut each slice in half horizontally ready for filling as you would a sandwich.
- Fill:Spoon the jam into a bowl with the lemon juice and blend together, then toss the strawberries in the jam to give a glaze. Mix the whipped cream and crème fraîche together and spread or pipe a fairly thick layer over the base of each half-sponge. Arrange two or three glazed pieces of strawberry on top, sit the top half of the sponge on top and dust with icing sugar to serve.
FAQs
Is this Mary Berry’s recipe or Lucy Young’s?
Lucy’s, printed in Berry’s book. Berry’s headnote says Lucy has worked with her for 25 years, and calls the slices a twist on the classic Victoria sandwich. Most pages using this keyword don’t mention that, which is why it’s here twice.
Berry does describe the idea in her own words elsewhere, just without quantities. In the traybake chapter of Baking Bible (2010) she points out you can make a layered cake from traybakes by sandwiching two together with a filling of your choice, such as jam or butter cream. That’s the same principle at whole-cake scale, and it’s where you’d go if you wanted one big cake rather than 27 small ones.
How is this sponge different from Berry’s basic traybake?
Two changes, both small and both deliberate. Lucy’s uses 300g of self-raising flour where Berry’s Basic All-in-one Sponge Traybake uses 275g, and it adds a teaspoon of vanilla extract, which Berry’s plain version doesn’t have at all.
Everything else lines up: 225g of fat, 225g caster sugar, 4 eggs, 2 level teaspoons of baking powder, 4 tablespoons of milk, and the same 30 x 23cm tin at the same temperature. One practical difference in the method is worth copying. Lucy lines the base and the sides, not just the base, which matters when you’re going to lift the whole slab out and trim it square.
Why mix crème fraîche into the cream?
The filling is 300ml of whipped double cream mixed with 200ml of full-fat crème fraîche, so it’s roughly three parts cream to two parts crème fraîche. Neither Lucy nor Berry explains why in the recipe.
My own read, having eaten a lot of Victoria sandwiches, is that it stops the filling being cloying. Straight whipped cream against jam-glazed strawberries and a sweet sponge is a lot of sweetness in one bite, and crème fraîche brings acidity without thinning the mixture the way soured cream would. Whether you agree or not, use full-fat as specified, since low-fat versions will slacken.
Why glaze the strawberries in jam?
It’s two tablespoons of strawberry jam blended with a teaspoon of lemon juice, then the halved strawberries are tossed through it to give a glaze. The lemon juice loosens the jam enough to coat rather than clump.
The glaze is doing the same job jam does in a classic Victoria sandwich, just carried on the fruit instead of spread on the sponge. If you want a different flavour behind the fruit, her lemon curd works the same way with the same lemon juice trick, though that’s my suggestion rather than anything in the book.
Can I make it ahead?
Yes, and the notes are unusually precise about which stage. Unfilled, the cake keeps well in an airtight tin for a day. Once filled, the slices can be stored in the fridge up to 8 hours ahead.
For longer than that, freeze the cake without the filling, wrapped in cling film and foil. That’s the sensible route for a party, since the sponge is the slow part and the filling takes minutes. Both notes come from the recipe itself rather than being borrowed from elsewhere.
Do I have to cut 27 slices?
No, and Berry is relaxed about this across her traybakes. In Ultimate Cake Book (2003) she says she generally specifies 21 pieces for a medium traybake, but that it’s just a rough guide, and that you can cut the cake into whatever size pieces you prefer, large for hungry teenagers or small two-bite pieces for younger children.
The 7 x 3cm oblong is what gives these their neat, patisserie look, so I’d keep the size if presentation matters. If it doesn’t, cut bigger. Just remember every slice gets split and filled, so fewer, larger slices means the same cream and strawberries spread further. The tin itself is the standard one she uses for her spiced Dorset apple traybake.
