Rainbow Cake!

Rainbow Cake, the vital statistics:
Time: Two-and-a-half hours. Yes, it is very time consuming, but it's very easy as well and the time would actually be cut in half if I had a second cake tin of the same size and shape as this one. So if you've got two cake tins of the same size, it'll be much quicker.
Cake mixes: Two packets.
Food dye: 3/4 bottle of yellow, 1/2 bottle of blue, 3/5 bottle of green, 1 1/2 bottles of red. Yes, you do need this much dye. It takes a surprising amount of it to get past pastels.
Cooking instructions: Follow the packet instructions for the cake mix, then divide the mixture up into six equal portions. Dye these portions. Then scoop them into a cake tin, one colour at a time. DO NOT mix them together/swirl the stuff to get a rainbow effect. It does it itself.

Before we go on, I must warn you that you may suffer from some form of hyperactivity simply by looking at the colours to come...

^ Plain old vanilla cake mix. The packet said that it didn't have any artificial colours or flavours. Not for long, I thought.


^ Whizzy mixy goodness.


^ Separating it all up. Remember to wash things up as you go, by the way, or the amount of dishes, etc at the end will make you weep when you look at the sink.


^ And it all starts from here...


^ Half done!


^ Mmm, blue.


^ Time to make purple and I ran out of red! Noooooo!


^ Thankfully I have another packet of food dyes in the cupboard.


^ Doesn't it look delicious?


^ All done with the dying!


^ This made me think of R L Stein for some reason.


^ The first layer of the cake is in the tin and ready to go in the oven!


^ First layer cooked. I'm glad I used as much dye as I did, because there was a bit of fade as the cake cooked. Not a whole lot, but a bit. I'm sure there's still enough colouring in here to make even the most resolute person quake in their boots...


^ Second layer half "loaded" into the tin.

^ Compare and contrast... Second layer ready to go into the oven.

It's all finished cooking now and I'm debating whether to actually layer them or just have them as two cakes. With two cakes, it means that more people can partake of the hypercoloured wonder that is the Rainbow Cake. Might even do two different types of icing for it or something like that. We'll see. I'm letting the cakes cool at the moment.

While I was baking them, I was thinking about food colourings, additives and so on and thought that on the whole, they're not really such an evil thing. I'm sure parents would disagree with me, but hear me out.

When I was young, I'd occasionally get a Golden North ice-cream cone after school and loved their rainbow ice-cream. That ice-cream was most definitely mood enhancing/changing for me and I'd say the artificial colours and flavours would definitely be the ones to credit for that, rather than the sugar content. But it was fun. And I'd wear myself out thanks to the high and sleep quite well.

And it was delicious.

If I were to have kids now days, I'd much rather they ran around outside high on artificial colours and flavours than sitting inside playing computer games or whatever. Not every single day, obviously, but now and then is okay for fake flavouring and colours that make you wonder whether they glow in the dark or are the result of a nuclear accident.

Besides, I'm pretty sure the hyperactivity-inducing colours/flavours were put in there to create the high so the kids ended up running around like maniacs to wear the sugar energy off ;)