*You can use 1 1/2 cups sugar for a sweeter cake. I cut the sugar down by 1/4 cup because the frosting I was using for the cake was really sweet.

**I used Oreos, but you can use any brand of vanilla cream filled cookies you like. Chop them up into small pieces the size of large chocolate chips. Hold each cookie down along the edges so that the top most part of the sandwich cookie doesnu2019t slide off when you cut through. Use a s sharp knife and cut straight down through the cookies. This way they will cut up mostly into neat pieces. Pick only the pieces and donu2019t add the crumbs to the batter if you want a clean looking cake dotted with chocolate bits.

Make the cakes first. Put all the ingredients for the cake, except the chopped Oreo cookies, in a bowl. Using an electric mixer, beat at low speed for about 30 seconds while scraping the batter from the sides frequently. Then beat on high speed for about 2 minutes, scraping down the batter from the sides occasionally.

Turn off the mixer and fold in the chopped cookies. Divide the batter equally between two 7u201d or 8u201d round cake tins lined which are with parchment paper at the bottom and the sides have been well greased. Smooth the top lightly.

Bake at 180C (350F) for about 30 minutes or till the cakes are a golden brown and a skewer inserted in the centre of the cake comes out clean. Let the cakes cool in the pan for about 10 minutes. Then carefully take the cakes out, peel off the parchment from the bottom and let them cool down completely.

Now make the Vanilla Buttercream. Put the soft butter in a large bowl, and using an electric mixer, whip the butter so it becomes lighter in colour and fluffy (for about a couple of minutes).

Now add about 3 cups of the icing sugar, and keep beating until it is well incorporated. Add another 2 cups of icing sugar and beat till incorporated. Now add 2 tbsp of milk and the vanilla extract and beat well. Add as much of the remaining icing sugar as needed and beat well to get the consistency needed to pipe the buttercream. You can adjust the thickness of the buttercream by adjusting the amount of milk or icing sugar till youu2019re satisfied with the way your buttercream consistency.

Refrigerate the buttercream till you need it. If necessary, beat the buttercream to fluff it up before decorating the cake. This recipe will make enough buttercream to frost this cake. You might have some left over.

To put together and decorate the cake, start with the cooled cakes. Once the cakes have cooled, make sure the tops are level. Otherwise level them by trimming off the dome, if necessary. My caked didnu2019t dome much so I left them as they were.

Place one cake on your plate, bottom facing upwards, and pipe/ fill with enough buttercream to form a sandwich layer. Place the second cake, bottom facing downwards over this slowly so the edges of both cakes are matched at the edges. If the buttercream seems to be softening, refrigerate the cake for some time before proceeding.

Now cover the top and sides of the sandwiched cake with a u201ccrumb coatu201d which is a thin layer of buttercream that covers the cake completely and seals the crumbs. Then fill a disposable piping bag fitted with an open star nozzle/ tip (a bigger one) with the buttercream. The recommended nozzle/ icing tip size is Wiltonu2019s 1M tip which is also what I used, but Iu2019m sure any large open star icing nozzle/ tip should work.

Pipe rosettes along the sides and the top of the cake. The rosettes are easy enough to pipe but they need a little practise. I ended up scraping my first three attempts off the cake before I got mine right! I started by piping my rosettes on the top of the cake, from the edge to the centre.

Cover the cake with rosettes, filling in the gaps in between the rosettes with buttercream as well. Refrigerate the cake until ready to serve.