Fondant Fancies- Iced Sponge Cakes
FANCY UP ANY HOLIDAY OR SPECIAL OCCASION
This year for Christmas and New Years I wanted to make a few fancier smaller cakes so I decided to make Fondant Fancies. Fondant Fancies are individual sponge cakes also known as French Fancies back in the UK and Ireland where they were introduced in 1967 under the name Mr. Kipling.
Mr Kipling is a brand of cakes, pies and baked goods marketed in the United Kingdom and Ireland. It was introduced in May 1967 (at a time when cakes were more often bought from local bakers), to sell cakes of a local baker’s standard to supermarkets, and grew to become the United Kingdom’s largest cake manufacturer by 1976- WIkipedia
Related: Nicola’s Cinnamon Meringue Petit Fours
These fondant fancies are small bite size sponge cakes that have marzipan on the top then covered in fondant icing. You can also drizzle icing designs on top of your fondant fancies to help distinguish what type of cake it is or what is inside the layered sponge cake. The great thing about the Fondant Fancies are that they are bite-size and you can be as creative as you’d like with them for any occasion.
Mr Kipling French Fancies are small sponge cakes, resembling petits fours, topped with a hemisphere of vegetable-oil “buttercream”. The cakes are coated with fondant icing, with several varieties drizzled with a second colour. Standard varieties are pink (“strawberry”) with white drizzle, yellow (“lemon”) with chocolate drizzle, and brown (chocolate) with chocolate drizzle- Wikipedia
Fondant Fancies make lovely gifts and holiday treats
I thought baking some fondant fancies would be a really nice touch for the kids to take to school for their teachers Christmas presents. I am doing a little basket of homemade goodies so the Fondant Fancies will make an excellent addition to the peppermint patties and chocolate orange truffles I’ve already made.
I brushed a mixture of apricot jam and lemon juice to the cooled sponge cakes for flavour but some people fill their Fondant Fancies with all sorts of jams or jellies. Typically the sponge cake is lemon or vanilla but if you like chocolate you can make chocolate Fondant Fancies as well.
Related: Chocolate Peanut Butter Truffles
It doesn’t need to be a lot but that homemade touch makes all the difference when creating a holiday basket or a basket for any special occasion. I’ve seen Fondant Fancies at Weddings, Birthday parties, Baptisms and just because. While shopping at the Bulk Barn I also found some cute candy sprinkles snowflakes, candy canes, holly and Christmas trees which will add some holiday pizzazz to the final presentation of my fondant fancies.
My daughter helped me make the Fondant Fancies but I think she ate more than helped. I did the same thing when I was a kid. It’s more interesting to taste-test the product than it is to make it sometimes. That’s fine as long as she takes this tradition and passes it along to her family and friends.
Related: Old-Fashioned Gingerbread Cookies
The Fondant Fancies are a great way to switch up making cupcakes and once they are done you can sit them in decorative liners to put on display for your guests or box them up to give away. Either way you will wow anyone who you share these with because they will think you worked for hours on the detail.
Fondant Fancies are easy to make and always a hit!
How to make Fondant Fancies
- 2/3 cup butter
- 3/4 cup caster sugar or granulated sugar
- 3 eggs beaten
- 1 1/2 cups self-raising flour or all-purpose flour
- 1/3 cup ground almonds
- 1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla essence
- 2 tablespoons apricot jam sieved
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- 250g tub marzipan
- For the icing
- 1/4 cup vegetable fat/lard
- 2 tablespoons lemon juice
- 5 cups icing sugar
- Preheat oven to 190oC/375oF
- Cream butter and sugar until fluffy then beat in the eggs and 2 tablespoons of flour.
- Fold in the rest of flour, almonds and vanilla essence also known as extract.
- Spoon into well greased tin
- Bake for 20mins
- Once baked let the cake cool.
- Heat the apricot jam and lemon juice in a pan then brush over the cooled bottom of the cake.
- Roll out the marzipan and trim into rectangle the same size as the sponge.
- Cover the top of sponge, then cut into six or seven 4cm/ 1 1/2″ fingers then cut evenly into 4 rectangles (or diamonds)
- To make the icing, melt the fat, lemon and 60ml water (Tip- use the measure from a mixture bottle it’s a lot easier to work out).
- Add 1 1/2 cups icing sugar and bring to the boil
- Remove from the heat and gradually add the rest of the icing sugar until smooth. If you find its too thick add 1 tablespoon of warm water.
- Sit the cakes on a wire rack placing a sheet of parchment underneath. Then spoon the warm icing sugar over each cake until completely covered.
- If you find you don’t have enough icing to coat the cakes remove the surplus from the tray and melt over a pan of simmering water.
- Let the icing cool before decorating.
There you have some of the best bite-size finger sweets for any occasion. During Christmas these amazing Fondant Fancies are nice to put on your plate of cookies to impress your friends and family who come to visit.
Enjoy
Nicky xx
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These look so yummy!!! What size pan do we use for these? I have a niece getting married early November 2016 and I’m sure there will be a shower with the family. Given that I always get asked to bring desserts to any family get together these might be a little different to knock the socks of the family!! Thanks so much for this recipe!!
Merry Christmas to the family Nicola!!!!!
Hi Christine,
It’s a 16×11 pan. I will add that now. 🙂