Can I Make Larger A Devil's Food Cake And A Larger Victoria Sponge?

Asked by Lexy21196. Answered on 7th November 2025

Full question

I want to make Nigella's Devil's Food Cake as one of the cakes for my wedding and the Victoria Sponge as another, but in order to feed the number of guests our plan is to use double the quantities, and make both cakes 10" and three tiers.

I know that the cooking times will inevitably be different for the larger cakes but before we go ahead with our trial runs I was wondering if there were any other variables I might not have accounted for here. The only other thing I can think of is that we have our own hens (all warrens) and I'm unsure if egg size will play a role as the sizes are not as consistent as shop-bought eggs.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Victoria Sponge

By Nigella

Our answer

Nigella's Devil's Food Cake (from KITCHEN) and Victoria Sponge are popular cakes that are baked in 20cm/8-inch pans. However, if you go from a 20cm/8-inch pan to a 25cm/10-inch pan then you only need 1.5x the recipe quantities. If you use 2x the quantity of ingredients then it is possible that the cake batter will overflow from the pans as the cake bakes. UK large eggs are the equivalent of US extra large eggs, but you might find it easier to go by weight; UK large eggs (in their shells) weigh between 63g and 73g per egg (approximately 2 1/2 - 2 3/4 ounces per egg).

Baking times are a bit more tricky as the Devil's Food Cake batter is more liquid than the Victoria Sponge batter, but we would estimate that the Devil's Food Cake layers will take around 40 minutes at 180c/160c fan/350F. You may want to check at 35 minutes and may need to go to 45 minutes, as ovens vary. The Victoria Sponge is likely to take about 35 minutes at this oven temperature, but check at 30 minutes and you may have to bake for slightly longer than 35 minutes. In both cases the cakes should be risen, firm to the touch and a cake tester inserted into the centre should come out clean. Finally, we assume you are referring to 3 tiers of 2-layer cake and not single tier 3-layer cakes. For tiered cakes we should mention that both cakes, and particularly the Victoria Sponge, are unlikely to be able to take the weight of 3 stacked tiers, so you will need to use dowelling rods and appropriate supports for the cake tiers.