Rainbow Loaf Cake

A bright and colourful rainbow loaf cake, flavoured with vanilla and topped with whipped cream

Course Dessert

Cuisine British

Keyword Cake, Rainbow

Prep Time 30

Cook Time 1

Total Time 1 30

Servings

Calories 426kcal

Author thebakingexplorer

200 g Butter or baking spread unsalted, softened
200 g Caster sugar
4 Eggs large
200 g Self raising flour
1 ½ tsp Vanilla extract
Red, yellow, orange, green, blue and purple food colouring Use professional grade for best results

Pre-heat the oven to 160C Fan/350F/Gas Mark 4 and grease and line a 2lb loaf tin
Mix together the butter or baking spread and caster sugar until light and fluffy, ideally using an electric mixer or a stand mixer with the paddle attachment
Add the eggs and vanilla extract, and mix in well
Fold in the self raising flour gently until fully combined
Divide the mixture equally into six bowls, use scales for accuracy if you like. Colour each bowl with the food colouring so you have bowls of red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple cake batter
Add the batter into the loaf tin in alternating spoonfuls until you run out of batter, then use a butter knife to swirl the mixture around a little. Bake for an hour, or until a thin skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean. Leave to cool fully
Whip up the double cream with the icing sugar and vanilla until thick. Pipe or spread it onto the loaf cake and decorate with sprinkles if using
Store in an airtight container in the fridge if it has the whipped cream on, or in a cool place if not, and eat within 3 days. Or you can freeze it for up to 3 months

- Make sure all your ingredients (particularly the butter and eggs) are at room temperature before you start baking.

- You will need to use a professional grade food colouring to get the same bright colours that you can see in my photos. Brands I recommend are Colour Mill, Rainbow Dust Pro Gel and Sugarflair.

- You can top the loaf cake with a vanilla buttercream if you prefer. Check out my Vanilla Loaf Cake for a vanilla buttercream recipe.

- You will need a 2lb loaf tin for this recipe (you can test the size of your loaf tin by seeing how much water the tin can hold, 2lb will hold about 2 pints/1100ml of water). If you have a 1lb loaf tin, simply halve the ingredient amounts.

- Although I provide cup measurements, I highly recommend weighing your ingredients out using digital kitchen scales. It is the most accurate way to measure ingredients and will ensure the best results. Digital scales are very low cost and can be purchased for around £12 ($16.50).

- For teaspoon (tsp) and tablespoon (tbsp) measurements, please use measuring spoons and not the type of spoons you eat with. Again this will ensure accuracy and provide the best results.