Australian Lamingtons

Formula 1 season is upon us with the first event in Australia this weekend. You may have seen the new blog challenge that I’ve launched, Formula 1 Foods – the idea being to bake or cook something from the country that is hosting each race. As well as celebrating the global popularity of F1 it’s also a good way of getting involved if you’re not an F1 fan but maybe live with people who are!

When I saw that the first destination was Australia I immediately thought of Lamingtons; I’ve never eaten or even seen any other than on blogs and in recipe books before but I know they are an Australian speciality. I recently took a baking class taught by an Australian who even referred to rectangular baking tins as Lamington tins!

There are various stories about the origins of the Lamington, which you can read here.

A Lamington is a pretty simple type of cake – a vanilla sponge cake baked as a single layer and sliced into squares. Each square is then dipped in a chocolate sauce and coated in dessicated coconut. Sometimes they are served sandwiched together with jam and cream which I think makes it more of a dessert.

  

I used a Jamie Oliver recipe which you can find online here:

http://www.jamieoliver.com/news-and-features/features/australia-homemade-lamingtons/

Cutting the cake into squares and ready to dip

Drying on a rack after dipping

They were very easy to make; a little messy with the dipping but I think these would be fun to make with children.

When you cut or bite into them you see how the chocolate sauce has soaked in, making the sponge nice and moist. I'm not keen on dessicated coconut normally but these were really nice!

I am sending this to my new blog challenge Formula 1 Foods as the first country is Australia.

I am also sending this to Treat Petite as the theme is Mother’s Day and mums; these would be good for children to make for Mother’s Day and particularly welcome if your mum is from Australia I think! The challenge is hosted by Stuart at Cakeyboi and Kat aka The Baking Explorer.

As these are child-friendly bakes I am also sending them to Family Foodies.