Kim Joy’s Phoenix Bonfire Night

Method

The day before, preheat the oven to 170°C/ Fan 150°C/Gas 6. Grease 5 x 18-cm cake tins with butter and line the bases with baking paper.

Add the butter, sugar and salt to a stand mixer, and whisk on medium speed until the butter is smooth, then increase the speed to high and whisk until the butter is fluffy and pale. Lightly beat the eggs in a separate bowl. Add the egg mixture, 1 tbsp at a time, to the creamed butter and sugar mixture, beating well after each addition. Add the vanilla bean paste and mix to combine. It's also worth noting that you can flavour these cakes any way you want, by substituting the vanilla bean paste for any manner of flavourings. Pumpkin spice drops are a fantastic alternative, or you could use grated orange zest.

In a separate bowl, mix the milk and yogurt together. Sift the flour, baking powder and almond flour together into another bowl. Alternate between sifting in the flour and adding milk and yogurt to the main mixture, mixing on slow speed after each addition. Be careful not to overmix.

Divide the batter between the prepared cake tins and bake for 30–35 minutes until a skewer or a knife inserted in the centre comes out clean. When the cakes are baked, leave them to cool in their tins for 5 minutes, then run a knife around the edges and turn out onto wire racks. Peel off the baking paper and leave to cool.

Fill a large shallow dish (wide enough so that the wrapper can be dipped straight in) with warm water and a few drops of red dye. Soak a rice paper spring roll wrapper in the water for 1 minute, then place on baking paper or a rolling pin in whatever shape you would like them to set into. You can use clips to roll up or create folds in the paper or mat. Leave to dry overnight. Once dry, you can paint some of the edges and folds with a little edible gold paint.

The next day, shape a baby phoenix using red fondant, adding edible gold leaf and painting with food dye to add interest.

Make your buttercream. Place the butter, salt and icing sugar in a stand mixer and whisk on slow speed until the icing sugar is combined (you may want to cover the bowl with a tea towel to prevent the icing sugar from flying everywhere!). Increase the speed to high and whisk until light and fluffy, scraping down the sides of the bowl with a spatula when necessary to ensure everything mixes properly. Add milk, 1 tbsp at a time, to achieve a spreadable consistency.

Assemble your cakes, beginning with a cake board that is just slightly larger than your cakes. Smear a layer of buttercream over each cake, then, cover the top of the cake with a solid layer of room temperature buttercream. You can pipe this buttercream on, or you can just spread it on with an offset spatula. Smear the top and sides of your cake in buttercream using an offset spatula. To get an even finish on this, warm the cake scraper that you are using by running it under hot water – the heat helps make everything nice and smooth. Spread a second coat of buttercream all over the chilled crumb coat using a palette knife and smooth again. Leave the top edge rough, then paint the rim gold. Chill in the fridge until firm again.

While the cake is chilling, divide the remaining buttercream between 3 bowls and colour yellow, orange and red using food dye. Once the base has chilled, use a palette knife to paint strokes of the coloured buttercream to look like a flame. Apply gold leaf for added interest.

Sprinkle the sugar over the (chilled) buttercream on top of the cake, then using a handheld blowtorch, caramelise the sugar. Place the phoenix on top and arrange smaller sails to look like its wings.

Stick more sails into the side of the cake, arranging them so that it looks like they are all part of one tall flame. Use around 5–6 rice paper sails for up the sides of the cake and on top, then 2 for the wings and another for the tail.