Classic Jam and Coconut Sponge Cake (2024)

Jam and Coconut Sponge Cake is another classic recipe in the UK that’s often associated with school dinners.

It’s a simple sponge cake with jam spread over the top and a generous sprinkle of desiccated coconut added to top it all off.

Serve with a big jug of pink custard, and you’ll be sure to invoke memories in anyone who went to school here a while back! We love to recreate old-school puddings for a bit of nostalgia. Just see our Cornflake Tart, Old School Sponge Cake, and Butterscotch Tart for more inspiration.

Coconut and Jam Sponge is an easy bake to make, and it serves plenty if it’s made as a traybake. It can be served cold or warmed up, with or without custard, so it’s a great option for feeding plenty for morning or afternoon tea or having as a pudding.

This Jam and Coconut Cake was a hit with our boys, and we’ll certainly be making it more often from now on!

I can’t find anything specific about the history of this recipe other than that it was served at school dinners, so we’ll have to assume someone just came up with it one day and the idea spread. Literally!

Things you’ll need to make Coconut and Jam Sponge Cake

• Rectangle Cake Tin measuring 9x12inches – or use a larger 9x13inch tin for a thinner cake, but you may need to reduce the cooking time slightly as it will cook through faster
• Large bowl for mixing
• Mixer or electric beater – It’s important to mix the ingredients thoroughly (but not over-mix, of course!) so use a mixer if you have one with a low setting or an electric beater set on low. If you’re sticking to a spoon and bowl, just add the ingredients slowly so you can get them all mixed together properly.
• Digital scales – for measuring the ingredients with precision. More on that later!

Ingredients for Jam and Coconut Sponge Cake

• 400g butter/margarine at room temperature
• 400g caster sugar
• 400g self-raising flour
• 1 tsp vanilla essence OR 1 tbsp lemon zest
• 7-8 medium eggs
• 150g strawberry or raspberry jam
• Desiccated coconut to taste

Butter or Margarine

Butter and margarine are interchangeable in this sponge cake, so go with what you prefer! We personally like to use Stork, a brand of margarine, as it produces a light and fluffy sponge.

To beat it with the sugar, the butter will need to be at room temperature, but margarine can be chilled.

Lemon Zest or Vanilla

We would usually go with a vanilla sponge for this Jam and Coconut traybake, but you can swap it out for lemon zest if you prefer a bit of zing in your cake and less sweetness.

Eggs

Sponge cake recipes are usually made with equal parts butter, sugar, flour, and eggs. The first three are easy to measure out, but the last one is less so!

Despite eggs being sold according to size, they can vary greatly in weight.

There are a few options for deciding if you need 7 or 8 eggs in this recipe.

Firstly, weigh the eggs in the shell. This adds around 10% per egg but does give you a close idea. Choose whichever option is closest to 400g.

Secondly, have your bowl on a scale and as you add the eggs stop at 7 or continue to 8 to get you as close to 400g as possible.

And finally, if you want to be REALLY specific, you can crack the eggs open and weigh them, and then just match the rest of the ingredients to that weight. I usually like to do this method as it’s the most specific.

This means you will end up using a random amount of flour, sugar, and butter, like 412g, or 420g, or even 395g, etc. Use an electric scale for precision!

I take another bowl and set my scale to zero with the bowl on it, then measure out 8 eggs, and match the rest of the ingredients to that amount.

When it comes to adding the eggs, I just use a spoon/fork to slide them out of the bowl and into the mixture to mix, roughly one by one.

Raspberry or Strawberry Jam

It’s really up to you which jam you use! A slightly tart jam like raspberry helps to cut through the sweetness, but there’s nothing stopping you from using any other jam as well.

You could even use totally different flavours like blackcurrant or rhubarb and ginger. Whatever you have in the cupboard, your favourite, or whatever you fancy is the best!

How to Make Jam and Coconut Sponge Cake – Step by Step Method

Preheat the oven to 180C/160C fan or 350F/320F

Grease 12 x 9 inch traybake tin

Cream the butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy

Add one egg at a time and fully mix in

Add vanilla essence or zest

Sift flour and fold into the batter

Tip into greased cake tin and bang on the bench to get rid of any air pockets

Bake for 40-50 minutes

Allow to cool in the tin

Once cooled, soften the jam by heating it for about 10-20 seconds in the microwave, then spread it over the cake. If you like you can poke holes in the cake so some jam sinks in, but it’s not really necessary.

Sprinkle with desiccated coconut to finish it off.

Remove from the tin and slice into squares. Enjoy!

How to Serve Jam and Coconut Sponge Cake

You can serve Jam and Coconut Sponge the same as any cake, as is, or you can reheat and pour over some warm custard, or better yet, pink custard, for more of a pudding!

How Long Does Jam and Coconut Sponge Cake Last?

Keep this cake in an airtight container for up to 3-4 days. It will dry out the longer you keep it, so you may want to have custard with it in the later days.

And that’s our easy Coconut and Jam Sponge recipe!

Here are some other traybakes to check out:

• Old School Sponge Cake
• Tottenham Cake
• Sticky Toffee Pudding Traybake
• Kinder Bueno Brownies
• Malteser Traybake
• Biscoff Rocky Road
• Chocolate Tiffin
• Mars Bar Slice
• Biscoff Tiffin

Happy baking!

Sonja and Phil

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