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Hot Water Sponge Cake
One cup of granulated sugar, two eggs, one cup of sifted flour, one teaspoon of baking powder, one-half teaspoon of vanilla, one-third cup of boiling water. Beat sugar and eggs thoroughly together, add the flour in which the baking powder has been mixed, then the flavoring, and lastly the hot water, and bake at once in a moderately hot
— Mrs. Celia S. Chadwick
oven.
A one-bowl sponge that relies entirely on air beaten into whole eggs and sugar, with boiling water for extra lift. The line about baking "at once" is the whole recipe in miniature.
- Oven temperature"Moderately hot" in books of this period is usually taken as somewhere around 375-400F. The recipe specifies no pan or time; a greased 8-inch square or round pan and roughly 25 minutes, until the top springs back and a skewer comes out clean, is a reasonable modern reading.
- The hinge: bake immediatelyThe baking powder starts reacting the moment the boiling water hits it, and the whipped-egg foam begins to collapse at the same time. Have the pan greased and the oven fully preheated before you crack an egg.
- Beat the eggs and sugar properly"Thoroughly" here means five to eight minutes with a mixer, until the mixture is pale, thick, and falls from the beater in a ribbon. This is the only aeration the cake gets besides the teaspoon of baking powder.
- Folding, not beating, the flourOnce the flour and baking powder go in, fold with a spatula until just combined. Beating at this stage develops gluten and gives a tough, tight crumb.
- Egg sizeEggs of this period ran smaller than today's large eggs, closer to what is now sold as medium. Two large eggs will work, but the batter will be slightly looser.
- Cup measurementsThe cup is the standard 8 fl oz; one cup of granulated sugar is about 7 oz, one cup of sifted flour about 4 oz. Sift the flour before measuring, as directed, or the cake will be heavy.
- Yield and servingIn an 8-inch pan it makes one thin cake, about eight modest squares. Being fatless it is a lean, quick-staling sponge, and suits berries and cream, stewed fruit, or tea.
Hot-water sponge cakes appear in American community cookbooks from the late nineteenth century onward, and their appeal was economy: no butter, no separated eggs, no long creaming, and a texture that came from beating and steam rather than fat. The boiling water thins the egg-and-sugar foam just enough to fold in flour without deflating it, and it gives the leavening a head start ō which is why the instruction to bake at once is not a flourish but a requirement. Recipes like this one spread as chemical baking powders became cheap and reliable, a process already well under way by the middle decades of the century. The attribution to Mrs. Celia S. Chadwick is typical of the form: a compilation gathered the receipts neighbors were known for, and the name was as much a recommendation as the ingredient list.