As the Great British Bake Off returns to our screens, there's a new cake trend to get us all salivating - gaudy gateaus covered in frills of icing and stuffed with treats.

The piñata cake is named after the Mexican party centrepieces made from papier mache and filled with gifts, and has a hollow centre which is used to hold your favourite sweets.

Asda kicked off the trend last year with their Smartie pinata cake and Lakeland soon followed, selling all the paraphernalia needed to create the ultimate 'surprise' cake.

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Juliet Sears' Pinata Cake, filled with sweets and chocolates is the perfect centrepiece for a party

In her new book Cakeology, Juliet Sears shows how she hollows out the cake before stuffing it with treats

Top baker, Juliet Sears, who has included a recipe in her new book Cakeology (Hardie Grant), explains that "surprise cakes" have become popular during the last year.

She told FEMAIL: 'The idea that the cake contains more than first meets the eye is really exciting, and I have always loved piñatas, so I'm obsessed with Mexican themed parties.

And the good news is that this isn't as complex to make as it looks. 'The Piñata Cake looks really eye catching and really loud, so it looks like it's hard to make but this cake is probably one of the easiest in the world to do.

'It's simple to cut out a circle and fill it. Once you have made up all your colours, it is really easy to ice, as long as you have the right nozzle.'

Juliet Sears demonstrates how to slice sponge to create even layers for her 'surprise' cake (left and right)

The Cakeology author uses three layers and fills the centre with goodies before topping with another layer

Juliet uses buttercream which tastes better than roll-out icing and she uses a petal nozzle to create a wavy ruffle effect covering the sponge. Picking clashing colours gives it a 'fiesta vibe'.

'The ruffle design of the cake also makes things a little easier. If you are a bit messy or the circles are a little wobbly, it won't effect the overall wow factor of the cake,' she said.

'I would recommend anyone to give this a go. You can do any colour scheme, a Christmas one or even brand colours if you are celebrating an office anniversary, or for a baby shower try using blue and pink pastels and filling the inside with jelly dummies and bottles.'

But she suggests making sure the exterior of the cake is 'quite thick and chunky, so that it can hold a lot of sweets inside'. 'If the cake is too thin, then filling it can become very fiddly,' she said.

Juliet Sear demonstrates how to cut out a circle in the sponge to create the hole for the treats (left); she then ices the individual rings before filling it with Smarties, Celebrations and Bassets All Sorts

Juliet uses a petal nozzle to create the festive-looking frills round the outside of the cake

Juliet advises using a turntable to pipe the brightly-coloured frills on to the cake for a 'fiesta vibe'

Another important tip involves using a turntable. 'This will help when icing the cake. If you don't have a turntable, simply stand the cake on an upturned tin or large bowl to raise it to eye level and rotate the cake as you ice,' she advised.

'Also, you should use large piping bags, squeeze a small amount of butter cream towards the nozzle and then secure with a plastic bag clip. This way you don't have to squeeze the whole amount of buttercream out through the whole icing bag, you can twist it lower down and have more control.'

Juliet also suggests filling the cake with fresh berries which, although equally eye catching, are healthier than the usual sweets.

'A decadent version could be made with layers of chocolate, caramel and vanilla ruffles and the inside could be filled with luxury truffles and chocolates. You could also fill the inside with little biscuits, shop bought or hand made,' she said.

You can put small toys or gifts in piñata cakes too, but I love them with the sweets.'

London baker Molly Bakes has a vanilla sponge filled with blue and white Smarties and hundreds and thousands scattered on top to add to the party feel

Lakeland is selling kits to make pinata cakes (left); Asda helped kickstart the trend last year with their candy-coloured surprise gateau filled with sweets (right)

More home bakers are adding the signature icing frills and Smartie filling to their sponge cakes, as demonstrated by Lakeland which is selling kits

MOLLY BAKES' PINATA CAKE RECIPE London-based baker Molly Bakes (bakeitlikemolly.com) shares its recipe for a pinata cake You will need: 9” cake tin 500g colourful sweets of your choice (I popped to the M&Ms store to choose my very specific colours, Jelly Beans are great too) INGREDIENTS For the cake: 250g unsalted butter, softened 300g unrefined caster sugar 1 tsp vanilla extract 4 eggs, at room temperature 325g nature friendly self-raising flour 2tsp baking powder ½ tsp bicarb of soda 1/2 tsp salt 125ml milk, at room temperature Preheat oven to 180 degrees. Grease and line 4 9” sandwich cake tins. Sift the flour with baking powder, bicarb & salt and set aside. Beat the butter until light and fluffy. Add the sugar and cream together for five minutes. Mix the vanilla extract into the creamed butter and sugar. Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing for 1 minute between each addition. With the mixer on low speed, add half the flour and then half the milk until fully combined. Repeat with the remaining flour and milk. Don’t overmix. Evenly divide the batter between each of the tins. Bake for 20 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centre of each cake layer comes out clean. Turn out onto a wire rack and leave to cool. For the buttercream: 250g butter, softened 500g icing sugar 2 tsp vanilla 2 Tbsp milk Cream the butter until light and fluffy. Add the sugar gradually and beat on highest speed. Add the vanilla. Keep beating until the mixture smooth and creamy. Add the milk and keep beating for another few minutes. To assemble: Once the cake has completely cooled, spread a little of the buttercream onto a cake board or serving stand. Place the bottom layer of the cake onto the board. Spread the buttercream over the cake layer. Using a bowl or round tin that is at least 3” smaller in diameter than the cake as a template, cut the centre out of the two middle layers of the cake. Discard the centre of each layer as they won’t be needed. Place one of the cut layers on top of the bottom iced layer. Spread the buttercream over and repeat with the second cut out layer. Once this has been done fill the hole in the centre with sweets of your choice. Now spread the buttercream ready for the next layer and place the top layer on the cake. Ice the top of the cake and the sides. Decorate with sprinkles or decorations of your choice. Advertisement



