I made this cake in a class I took over the weekend. The class was described as “cake decorating”, but really it was make a cake and then frost it, with a little bit of time spent on practicing decorating. My decorating has improved but still needs a lot of work. This cake comes from Rose Levy Beranbaum – it’s a lovely vanilla chiffon cake, easy to make, tender, flavorful and forgiving and not so delicate that it falls apart when it’s cut into layers. There’s a bit of seedless raspberry jam in between the layers. The buttercream is wonderful, a vanilla Swiss buttercream that tastes great but isn’t the easiest to work with when practicing decorations.

• Vanilla Chiffon Cake
• Vanilla Buttercream