Is it possible to cook a sponge cake on... How to bake a sponge cake

Biscuit dough is one of the most common and easiest to prepare. It would seem that even a child can do it, all you need to do is mix flour, sugar and eggs, put it in the oven, and there it is, fluffy and fragrant. If you want to assemble a cake, you want to roll rolls. In fact, everything is approximately like this. But incidents often happen to it - it rises poorly, falls off after baking, or crumbles too much. To avoid all this, check out some rules and tricks of sponge dough.

1. The biscuit is made from sugar, flour and eggs in a ratio of 1:1:2
2. Use large eggs at room temperature. The biscuit does not use soda; the fluffy porous structure is achieved by whipping the whites into a strong foam. Logically, large eggs have more protein.
3. Bake the sponge cake only in an oven preheated to 180°.
4. The baking dish must be greased with butter, but not all of it. Only the bottom and walls no more than 1 cm in height are greased, otherwise the walls of the biscuit will not be able to rise, but the middle will rise, the biscuit will not be even and may crack. After the mold is greased, you need to make a “French shirt” - dust the mold with a thin layer of flour, turn the mold over and shake out the excess flour.
5. Up to 25% of flour can be replaced with potato starch. Starch will retain moisture, the biscuit will not dry out and will crumble less.
6. During the first 10-15 minutes of baking, do not open the oven or move the pans. Baking time depends on the thickness of the dough. If you are preparing cake layers with a height of 3-4 cm, the baking time will be 40-50 minutes. If you are preparing a roll (about 1 cm thick) - 10-15 minutes.
7. To prevent the biscuit from falling off, it is cooled in the molds. Then turn it over onto a wire rack so that the biscuit cools evenly on all sides.
8. After the finished biscuit has cooled, it can be wrapped in cling film and placed in the refrigerator overnight. This way the moisture inside the biscuit will be evenly distributed, the biscuit will not crumble, it can be cut into several cake layers, and its taste will become much better.
9. There are 2 ways to prepare sponge cake - cold and hot. When it is cold, it is necessary to separate the whites from the yolks; when it is hot, this is not necessary. If you suddenly decide to prepare a sponge cake using a cold method, but when separating the whites from the yolks, a drop of yolk gets into the whites, do not rush to throw it away. Prepare the sponge cake hot.
10. When preparing sponge cake, we use a mixer only to beat the whites and yolks. Then the mixer must be removed. You need to stir the flour into the yolk mixture and add the whites with a wooden or silicone spatula, stirring not in a circle, but from top to bottom. This way we mix all the ingredients and maintain the porous structure of the dough.

How to make a sponge cake hot and cold

Ingredients:

• 6 fresh large eggs;
• 200 g flour;
• 180 grams of sugar.

Cold way

Step 1. Separate the whites from the yolks. Beat the yolks with half the sugar for 5-8 minutes. The mass should increase 3 times, become almost white and hold its shape for 10 seconds.

Step 2. In a clean, dry, fat-free bowl, beat the egg whites with clean, dry whisks until the mass increases 3-5 times. Add the remaining sugar in a thin stream and beat until sharp peaks form.

Step 3. Mix the beaten yolks and a third of the whipped whites with a silicone spatula from bottom to top; there is no need to stir for long.

Step 4. Add flour in a thin stream and continue stirring from top to bottom until the flour is combined with the mixture. Not longer.

Step 5. Add the remaining whites and mix gently from bottom to top again, literally for a few seconds.

Step 6. Fill the greased molds 2/3 full and place them in an oven preheated to 180 degrees. We check readiness with a wooden skewer; it should be dry.

Hot way

Step 1. In a water bath, beat the eggs (both whites and yolks) until they warm up to 40-50 degrees.

Step 2. Continuing to beat with a mixer, remove the eggs from the bath, add sugar in a thin stream, beat until the mixture cools to room temperature and increases 2-3 times.

Step 3. Pour flour into the mixture and use a wooden spatula to knead the mixture from bottom to top.

Step 4. Pour into molds to fill 2/3 of the volume and place in an oven preheated to 180 degrees.

Biscuit translated from Italian means “twice baked.” A classic sponge cake is made from flour, sugar and eggs. A delicious sponge cake recipe may also contain cottage cheese, sour cream, kefir, chocolate, etc. Preparing a sponge cake, as a rule, does not take much time. It is for the speed of preparation and excellent results that many housewives love to prepare biscuit dough. Products made from it are lush and delicate. Baking biscuits can be very diverse. There are sponge cakes for cakes, rolls, pastries, etc.

How to make a sponge cake? A simple biscuit recipe, however, has some cooking features. It is the well-beaten egg whites and yolks with sugar and flour that give the baking its splendor. The quality of the biscuit largely depends on the freshness of the eggs, as well as on the temperature of all the ingredients included. The duration of whipping and baking mode play an equally important role. Our recipes will tell you how to prepare a biscuit. Preparing sponge cake at home will not be difficult if you follow all the cooking rules. To obtain the fluffiest and most tender sponge cake, it is recommended to carefully separate the yolks from the whites so that they do not mix. Egg whites are less susceptible to whipping if yolk or fat gets into them.

There are many biscuit recipes. The dough recipe may include grated lemon or orange zest, vanilla sugar, cocoa powder, chopped nuts, poppy seeds, raisins and other fillings. They must first be mixed with flour. You can add sour cream and kefir to the classic sponge cake, the recipe of which consists of eggs, sugar and flour. Sponge cake with sour cream and sponge cake with kefir are even more delicious and fluffy than the classic one. The recipe for sponge cake with sour cream will not cause you any difficulties. Chocolate sponge cake, the recipe of which includes cocoa powder, is especially popular among children who require preparing chocolate sponge cake regularly. We recommend making a very popular sponge cake with apples – charlotte. You can even try making a sponge cake without eggs - using vegetable oil and soda solution.

Cakes are baked from biscuit dough. The sponge cake recipe can be found on our website. The combination of sponge cake with various creams, fresh berries, fruits and nuts allows you to get a variety of delicious confectionery products. An important component for such sweet products is biscuit cream. The biscuit cream recipe may include cottage cheese or chocolate. Curd biscuit may contain cottage cheese both as a filling and as a component of the dough.

How to cook a biscuit? You can use two ways to prepare this delicacy - cold and hot. Beat egg whites only in completely clean containers without traces of fat. If the whites are not whipped well, they need to be cooled. You need to beat the whites until a stable foam forms. Overly beaten egg whites with small bubbles cause the dough to shrink during baking. The yolk must be ground white with sugar and whipped until foam forms. Mix the whites and yolks immediately, adding flour at the same time.

Cooking the sponge cake warm speeds up the process. How to make a sponge cake using the hot method? In a water bath at a temperature of 40-50 degrees. You can immediately beat the eggs with sugar. This sponge cake turns out denser and more crumbly than a cold-cooked sponge cake. It is best to beat the resulting mass in an electric mixer, but you can also beat it by hand. The finished dough should be immediately poured into special molds and baking should begin immediately.

How to bake a biscuit? A delicate structure and thin crust are obtained only if the sponge cake is baked correctly. Bake the biscuit over even medium heat. Do not open the oven while baking. But the finished biscuit needs to be left in the open oven for a while. This is done so that it does not fall off. A freshly baked sponge cake does not cut well, so after baking it is advisable to let it sit for about a day.

How to bake a sponge cake quickly? You can also cook the sponge cake in the microwave. This method is simpler than the previous one. The dough itself is a bit dry, so you need impregnation for the sponge cake. You can use chocolate, various syrups or alcohol as impregnation.

Prepare a sponge cake! Recipes with photos on our website will tell you how to do it correctly.

Regular visitors to our site know that if you need a cake recipe, then you need to go to Natasha - natapit . Of course, on our website (like nowhere else, perhaps) there are many excellent chefs who bake magnificent cakes, but we definitely won’t find such a collection as Natasha’s.

Below you can read her tips on the process of making two types: classic sponge cake And chiffon. This article was based on the popular one. The advice is based on her personal observations, and of course you can have your own opinion on this matter.

So!

Baking a classic biscuit

Eggs for sponge cake

Eggs that are used to make homemade biscuits must be very fresh and at room temperature. When baking regular biscuits, I never separate the whites from the yolks.

I start beating just the eggs first, at high speed and for at least 7-8 minutes. And only then gradually add sugar and beat for another 7-8 minutes.

Flour

Biscuit flour must be sifted! Moreover, it is better to do this 2-3 times and together with baking powder and vanilla (if they are added according to the recipe). By sifting flour, we enrich it with oxygen, it becomes softer and airier.
Flour is introduced into the egg mass in small portions and mixed with a wooden or silicone spatula from bottom to top in a circle.

Please note: When baking chocolate biscuits with cocoa added, the amount of flour is reduced. Namely: if you added 2 tablespoons of cocoa, then reduce the amount of flour by exactly the same number of spoons!

Oil

If butter is added to the biscuit, it must first be melted. Then let it cool slightly and add 2-3 tablespoons of biscuit mixture to it. Stir well, and only then combine with the rest of the dough. If you immediately add butter to the dough, it will fall to the bottom and it will be difficult to mix it well. This will take you a lot of time, and the sponge cake may fall and the dough will be spoiled.

Baking sponge cake

Various forms are used for baking biscuits. I mostly use a round springform pan. When baking regular biscuits, the mold is greased with butter and sprinkled with flour, and the bottom is covered with baking paper. I think this is in cases where baking powder is used and the biscuit rises due to it.

You need to bake biscuits in a perfectly level oven and always without fan mode. The pan should be on the middle shelf of the oven. As a rule, the recipe indicates in which oven - heated or cold - a simple sponge cake is baked, and although more than once I started baking in a cold oven, I still came to the conclusion that it is better to bake in a heated one!

DO NOT open the oven while baking, it may fall off. Also, DO NOT slam the oven door. The result will be disastrous. The readiness of the biscuit is checked by inserting a splinter (skewer) into the center - it should be dry. I think it’s better to cool the biscuit in the oven. Turning it off and opening the door. The cooled biscuit must be cut around the shape with a knife and only then open the shape and release the biscuit, which must be placed on a dish.

Baking chiffon sponge cake

I picked up the recipes for these wonderful biscuits from culinary expert Elena - elaizik, and here is what she writes about their history: “This is a typically American type of foam cupcakes and they have a specific author. In 1927, a recipe for chiffon cupcakes (so they were named for their extraordinary tenderness and airiness) was invented by Harry Baker, a Hollywood insurance agent. Twenty years later, in 1947, he sold his patent to General Mills and chiffon cupcakes began to be produced on an industrial scale.

Since these muffins contain liquid vegetable oil and not solid fat, it is impossible to beat a lot of air into such oil. Therefore, in such cakes (exas) almost double the amount of whites is placed in relation to the yolks, which are thoroughly beaten, absorbing a lot of air. This air and moisture evaporates from the dough and raises the cake. However, due to the decent amount of butter, you also have to add baking powder - baking powder (not soda! - since there is no acid in the dough). The technique of beating eggs also differs from a regular sponge cake. The yolks and whites are beaten separately. (You can read in detail how this is done in my recipe, and the same recipe also contains a method for cutting chiffon biscuits.)

First A very important point in preparing these biscuits is mixing the yolk mass and proteins. You must strictly follow the instructions, and it is best to watch a video lesson on that topic. When baking chiffon biscuits, it is very important to follow all the recommendations given in the recipe; this directly determines whether the biscuit will turn out or not.

Second, but an equally important point is how to properly cool a baked biscuit. The mold with the hot biscuit is turned upside down and left until it cools completely. Or you can turn the mold over onto glasses.

And one more important point! Creams and fillings for such biscuits should not be heavy. Otherwise the biscuit will settle.

• To avoid domes appearing on the baked sponge, place the sponge dough in the mold and, placing it on the work surface, turn the mold clockwise a couple of times.
• If bubbles still form on the surface of the dough, you need to hit the bottom of the pan a couple of times on the countertop.
• Unsweetened chocolate in recipes can be replaced with cocoa powder, according to the following scheme:
• every 30 grams of chocolate = 1 tbsp. l. butter + 3 tbsp. l. cocoa (flush with edges). It is clear that the reverse substitution is also possible if we want to replace cocoa with chocolate.
• If the dough contains cocoa, it can be replaced with the same amount of flour or starch. Accordingly, you can replace flour or starch with cocoa.
• If the recipe uses instant pudding, it can be replaced with the same amount of starch, provided that the dough or cream will then be cooked.
• Powdered sugar is made at the rate of 1 cup (measuring cup) sugar + 1 tbsp. l. starch
• Self-suiting flour is replaced with regular flour according to the following scheme: 1 teaspoon flour + 1 teaspoon baking powder.
• You can grind the nuts to flour using a blender by adding 2-3 tbsp per 200 g of nuts. l. powdered sugar, which will prevent the release of oil from the nuts.
• You can make your own cake flour. To do this, mix regular flour with cornstarch in equal ratios 1:1.

Of course, you can use ready-made tables, of which there are many on the Internet, but I developed my own conversion system for myself.
For example, consider a recipe for a classic sponge cake for a mold 20 cm in diameter.

Initial product consumption:

Large egg - 4 pcs. or 5 medium size
Flour – 140 g
Sugar – 200 g

The main ingredient that I focus on is the egg, which is why I focus on the number of eggs when converted to a larger or smaller volume of area.
In our case, with a mold volume of 20 cm – 20: 4 = 5 cm, that is, for 1 egg there is 5 cm of mold area.
For shapes 24-26 cm – you need 5 large eggs
For a shape of 28-30 cm - 6 large eggs.

In the same way, I recalculate products, both for chiffon and for any other biscuits that contain a larger number of ingredients.

Happy perfect sponge cake, friends!

• 09 January 2014, 20:20
• 769060

Prepare the ingredients for the biscuit.

Lightly grease a baking pan and line it with parchment paper (or grease it with butter, sprinkle with flour and shake off excess flour).
Sift the flour 1-2 times.
Separate the whites from the yolks.

The whites must be separated from the yolks very carefully so that not a drop of the yolk gets into the whites, otherwise the whites will not beat. Also, the bowl in which the whites will be beaten must be clean, without traces of fat. It is better to wipe it with a paper towel soaked in vinegar or lemon juice.

Place the yolks in a bowl, add half the sugar and vanilla sugar.

Grind the yolks well with sugar until they increase in volume and turn white.
The yolks can be mashed using a fork, whisk, mixer or rod chopper.

Place the whites in a clean bowl or mixer bowl.

Beat the whites with a mixer at medium speed until a light fluffy foam forms (to soft peaks).

Without stopping whipping, add sugar in a thin stream.
When all the sugar has been added, continue beating until the whites come out when you tilt (or turn) the bowl (be careful not to overbeat the whites).

Add a third of the whipped whites to the yolks.

And carefully, from top to bottom, mix with a silicone spatula.

Add sifted flour to the yolk mixture.

And mix well.

Then add the remaining whipped whites.

And very carefully, using top-down movements, as if lifting layer by layer, mix the dough.

Tip 1. The dough does not need to be stirred for a long time so as not to destroy the air bubbles that cause the sponge cake to rise.

Tip 2. You can add grated lemon or orange zest, sifted cocoa, and chopped nuts to the biscuit dough. These ingredients are pre-mixed with flour. If cocoa or nuts are added to the dough, you should take less flour by the same amount. Also, some of the flour can be replaced with starch.

Tip 3. The mold is filled with dough to no more than 2/3 of the height, since during baking the sponge cake increases in volume by about 1.5 times.

Pour the dough into the mold and smooth the surface.

Bake the biscuit in an oven preheated to 180°C for about 30-35 minutes.
Carefully remove the cake from the pan, place on a wire rack and let cool.

Tip 1. During baking, it is advisable not to open the oven door for the first 20-25 minutes, otherwise the biscuit may fall off. But, if there is no need, it is better not to open the door during the entire baking time of the biscuit.

Tip 2. The sponge cake is ready if it has shrunk a little, the edges move away from the walls of the mold and when you lightly press it with your fingers, the sponge cake springs back and the hole is quickly restored.

If the mold was not covered with parchment paper, you need to use a knife to walk along the edge of the mold and separate the sponge cake from the walls of the mold. Cover the cooled sponge cake with a napkin or paper towel and let it rest at room temperature for 8-12 hours (then, when soaked in syrup, the sponge cake will not become soggy and crumble when cutting ).

Enjoy your meal!

Biscuit is a universal baked product for confectioners. Almost no cake is complete without sponge cake; cakes and rolls are made from sponge cake, and used as a base for any confectionery product.

Fluffy, like a cloud, and quite dense, with butter and cream, with nuts and carrots - they are very different, but they are united by their cooking technology. Whatever the biscuit dough, you just need to beat the eggs (or separate whites and yolks) and add the rest of the ingredients as carefully as possible. It is due to the air added during whipping that your sponge cake will rise in the oven.

When baking a biscuit, two processes occur simultaneously. Firstly, the air in the dough heats up and, accordingly, expands; it causes the dough to rise in the oven, that is, increase in volume. Secondly, if there is enough heat (at a baking temperature of 180-200C), the walls of the growing pores are baked. Thus, to get the right sponge cake, you need to beat the eggs well, adding as much air as possible, mix the dough, being careful not to lose the added air, and then bake it correctly at a high enough temperature.

Before carefully studying Irina Chadeeva’s technology, we suggest watching a video recipe from professional pastry chef Oleg Ilyin!

What do we bake from?

FLOUR

Biscuits are baked thanks to the process of gelatinization of starch - when heated in wet dough, it changes its structure, becoming thicker and more viscous. Therefore, the presence of starch is important for a biscuit, and, accordingly, it can be baked from almost any flour - rice, wheat, corn, buckwheat (any flour contains starch). If you replace part of the wheat flour with starch, the biscuit will be stronger and more crumbly. You can bake a sponge cake without flour at all, just with starch. But there is no starch in nut flour (ground nuts), and therefore biscuits with nut flour are less durable and fall apart easily. Nevertheless, confectioners often make biscuits with nuts - they turn out very tasty!

EGGS

Without which it is basically impossible to bake a sponge cake, it is without eggs. It is the eggs that give it both fluffiness (when whipped) and strength (when baked). A well-beaten egg mass is the key to success when working with sponge cake.

SUGAR

For the biscuit, use regular sugar, preferably with small crystals. They dissolve faster, and accordingly, eggs beat better with them.

Basic biscuit recipe

There are many variations of sponge cake, but you should start with the simplest recipe, which, however, is no worse than the most complex. Remember the proportion:

4 eggs
120 g sugar
120 g flour
and no baking powder!

How to make a sponge cake:

1. First, measure out all the ingredients. Sift the flour (and also starch, if you use it) - it is saturated with air and then better mixed into the dough. Separate the eggs into whites and yolks (remember that cold eggs are best separated into whites and yolks), using a large bowl for the whites and a medium-sized bowl for the yolks.

Please note that the biscuit tins and trays must be prepared in advance, and the oven should also be preheated in advance. When the biscuit dough is ready, it must be immediately transferred to the mold (on a baking sheet) and baked without wasting time. The biscuit dough quickly settles, and the finished products from the settled dough turn out low and lumpy.

2. Pour half the sugar into the yolks and beat with a mixer at maximum speed into a thick, almost white mass.

3. Wash and dry the beaters and beat the egg whites at maximum speed until the mixture becomes white and thick. The mixer attachments should leave a clear, non-blurring mark. Just now add the remaining sugar and beat further until the mass becomes snow-white and shiny.

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4. Add the yolks to the whites and mix very carefully with a spoon until the mass becomes homogeneous and light yellow in color.

How to mix correctly? Take a spoon and place the side down into the middle of the bowl. Run the convex part of the spoon along the bottom (towards you), then up the side of the bowl, continue over the dough and lower the spoon back into the middle. The spoon will describe a circle. Repeat this movement, turning the bowl with your other hand. In this way, all types of biscuit (and other whipped) dough are quickly and accurately mixed. This method is called the folding method.

5. Add flour and other dry ingredients. Mix again using the folding method. Do not mix for too long as the dough may thicken too much.

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As soon as the lumps of flour disappear, stop. Transfer the dough into the mold, level the surface and place in the oven.

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What to add?

Butter is often added to biscuits. To do this, melt it, cool it and pour it in as carefully as possible. Even a small amount of butter makes the crumb more tasty and moist; biscuits with butter do not go stale longer.

How to prepare the form?

There are several ways to prepare molds and bake sponge cakes. Each has its own advantages and disadvantages. Sometimes it doesn't matter what pan you bake in, but sometimes it does.

Method No. 1

Grease the inside of the pan with softened butter (melted butter will drip and you won't get an even coating). Add a spoonful of flour and, shaking the pan, spread the flour first along the sides of the pan and then along the bottom. Tap the pan well to release excess flour.

With this method, the biscuit does not stick at all to the bottom and walls of the mold. After baking for 5–10 minutes, the sponge cake cools down and shrinks slightly in size, with a small gap appearing between the wall of the mold and the sponge cake, and a small mound remains on the sponge cake. Turn the biscuit over onto the wire rack; it will come out easily, with the mound at the bottom and the top completely flat.

DISADVANTAGE: When using this method the sponge cake comes out slightly lower.

Method No. 2

Do not grease the pan, but line the bottom with baking paper.

When baking, the sponge cake will stick to the walls, but when you take out the pan, it will also settle. Since the walls cannot settle (they are stuck), a “hill” will settle, thus, when cooling, the surface of the biscuit will become smooth. The biscuit is removed from the mold only when it has cooled completely. To do this, you need to very carefully run a knife along the walls, separating the biscuit, and remove the mold. Baking paper is removed before using the biscuit.

DISADVANTAGE: in order to separate the biscuit from the walls, skill and accuracy are required; Silicone molds cannot be used.

Method No. 3

Do not grease the pan or place baking paper on the bottom.

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This method is suitable for the lightest and most delicate biscuits, which settle under their own weight when cooling. These are biscuits with a small amount of flour and starch, as well as protein biscuits. It is usually recommended to cool them upside down - to do this, immediately after baking, turn the mold over and place it on bowls so that the sponge cake does not touch them. In this position, the bottom and sides of the biscuit are glued to the mold; it does not fall out, but also does not settle under its own weight. Please note that in this case it is important to choose the correct size of the mold so that the sponge cake does not turn out higher than the edges and can be turned over.

DISADVANTAGE: Sometimes it is difficult to separate the sponge cake from the pan; Silicone molds are not suitable for such baking.

Bakery

Always preheat the oven to 180-200°C in advance. It is advisable to bake biscuits on the middle level of the oven; you can use convection. Try not to open the oven during the first 15 minutes of baking to avoid cooling the air. You can check the readiness of the biscuit 25–30 minutes after the start of cooking. The finished biscuit is always evenly heaped and golden brown. Pierce it in several places (closer to the middle) with a toothpick; there should be no sticky dough on it. You can also press with your palm, the finished biscuit is elastic and durable.

IMPORTANT!

To ensure that the biscuit does not become soggy during soaking and is strong and elastic, it is advisable to let it sit for several hours. For cakes, I usually bake the sponge in the evening and leave it in the kitchen overnight. Please note that the biscuit should not dry out - for this, if the air in the kitchen is dry, you can put the biscuit in a bag after it has completely cooled.

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How to cut a biscuit?

One four-egg sponge cake baked in a tin with a diameter of 20 cm can usually be cut into three layers. To ensure that the cuts are even and the cakes are the same thickness, use a few simple techniques.

Place the sponge bottom side up - it's very flat and your cake will be flat on top too. It is convenient to use a sheet of baking paper, a flat plate or a wire rack as a base, the main thing is that you can easily turn the cake along with the base. Prepare a knife - it is highly desirable that it be sharp, with a blade that is longer than the diameter of the biscuit. A bread knife with a wavy blade works very well.

Using a knife, mark cutting lines about 1 cm deep around the circumference of the biscuit.

Insert a knife into the cut and cut, carefully turning the sponge and pressing the knife against the bottom cake, it should go exactly along the marked line.

Problems?

1. The dough is too liquid - the whites or yolks were not beaten well, the dough was stirred for too long;
2. The sponge cake does not rise well - the dough was mixed for a long time, the eggs were not beaten well, the oven was too cold;
3. The sponge cake sagged a lot after baking - the dough was poorly baked, there was not enough flour or starch;
4. The sponge cake has settled in the oven - the oven is too hot;
5. The biscuit crumbles a lot - too much starch.