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SPONGECAKE (another way)
Boil three-quarters of a pound of the finest loaf sugar pounded in a quarter of a pint of water containing a large spoonful of orange-flower water. Have ready the yolks of seven eggs and the whites of five beaten separately and then mixed, whisk them well, and as you do so pour into them the hot syrup. Stand the basin over a saucepan of boiling water, draw it back and whip the mixture for twenty minutes. Stir in lightly off the fire half a pound of dried and sifted flour. Add a little finely-shredded lemon-peel, and put the batter into the baking-pan, which must be greased and sugared as in the last recipe.
This is a hot-syrup sponge — closer to a génoise than to a creamed cake — and it rises on nothing but whipped egg. Everything depends on the syrup going in hot and thin while the eggs are moving.
- The hinge: pour hot, whisk hardThe syrup must be poured into the eggs in a thin stream with the whisk running continuously, or it will set the yolks into threads. The twenty minutes of whipping over hot water is what builds the entire structure; there is no baking powder anywhere in the recipe.
- Loaf sugarSugar was sold in hard cones that the cook broke and pounded. Ordinary granulated sugar is the direct replacement — 3/4 lb is about 1 2/3 cups.
- A quarter of a pint of waterFive British fluid ounces, or roughly 2/3 cup. The recipe says only to boil it; with that much sugar the syrup will thicken quickly, and something in the soft-ball region is the likely intention, but no stage is specified.
- Orange-flower waterStill sold, usually in small bottles in Middle Eastern groceries or the baking aisle. Strength varies a good deal between brands; start with a teaspoon rather than "a large spoonful" and taste.
- Over the water, then off itNote that the basin is stood over boiling water and then drawn back — the eggs are warmed, not cooked on the heat. The flour goes in off the fire and is to be 'stirred in lightly', i.e. handled gently so the foam does not collapse.
- Dried and sifted flourDrying flour by the fire was insurance against damp storage; modern flour needs only sifting. Plain (all-purpose) flour is right here, and 1/2 lb is about 1 3/4 cups.
- The oven, which the recipe omitsNo oven heat is given; the cross-reference to 'the last recipe' covers only the greasing and sugaring of the pan. A moderate oven, around 350F, suits this sort of batter; a cake of this size takes 35-45 minutes and is done when it springs back and pulls slightly from the tin.
- Greased and sugaredButter the tin and dust it with caster sugar rather than flour. This gives the thin crisp shell that was expected of a sponge cake of the period.
- YieldSeven yolks and five whites, with a pound and a quarter of sugar and flour between them — enough for roughly one deep 9-10 inch cake or two shallow tins, serving 10 to 12.
Sponge cake made with boiled syrup rather than creamed butter is one of the two Victorian methods: sugar boiled to a syrup and beaten into the eggs, with flour folded in at the last moment. Cassell's Dictionary of Cookery, compiled in the 1870s for the large middle-class household, prints several variants side by side under the same heading, which is characteristic of the book rather than a single cook's voice, so a reader could choose between the plainer whisked sponge and this richer syrup version. The orange-flower water and shredded lemon peel are the period's standard flavourings for a pale cake, dating from a time when distilled floral waters were as ordinary in a store cupboard as vanilla is now; vanilla extract only displaced them gradually over the later nineteenth century. The instruction to dry the flour is a reminder that flour was bought in quantity and kept in a bin, where it took up damp readily.