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Vienna Tarts
Mix 6 ounces of granulated sugar, 6 ounces of flour, 6 eggs, and 6 ounces of fresh butter. The butter must be melted, and added last. Beat well, for at least 10 minutes, before adding the butter, then 10 minutes more, and pour into a tin, thinly; bake it in a moderate oven until brown. Cut with a sharp knife into strips, 2 x 4 inches, spread with jam, and put together, covering the tops with whipped cream and chopped nuts.
This is a genoise sponge by another name: equal weights of sugar, flour and butter with six eggs, aerated entirely by beating. The instructions assume hand-whisking, which is where most of the translation work lies.
- The hinge: fold the butter, do not beat itThe original says to beat ten minutes more after the butter goes in, which made sense with a hand whisk and a cooling kitchen but will knock the air out of a batter raised by a stand mixer. Add the melted butter (warm, not hot) in a thin stream and fold it through with a spatula in as few strokes as will incorporate it.
- Weights in cups6 oz granulated sugar is about 3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons; 6 oz flour is roughly 1 1/3 cups; 6 oz butter is 1 1/2 sticks. Weighing is worth it here, since the whole structure depends on the three being in balance.
- Beating timeTwenty minutes total is a hand-whisk figure. With a stand mixer, whisk the eggs and sugar until pale and at the ribbon stage, about 5 to 8 minutes, then sift the flour over in two or three additions and fold.
- Moderate oven350F. The cake is thin, so it will colour and set fast.
- "Pour into a tin, thinly"A half-sheet pan (13 x 18 inches), buttered and lined with parchment, gives roughly a half-inch layer. Bake 12 to 18 minutes, until evenly brown and springing back when pressed.
- CuttingCool the sheet completely before cutting, and use a long serrated knife. Warm sponge tears and compresses. The 2 x 4 inch strips are sandwiched in pairs with jam, so a half-sheet yields about 20 strips, or 10 finished tarts.
- Assembly and holdingWhipped cream on top means these are a same-day item; assemble within a couple of hours of serving and keep them refrigerated. Apricot or raspberry jam, warmed slightly and sieved, spreads without dragging the crumb.
Adelaide Keen's With a Saucepan Over the Sea (1902) gathered recipes attributed to the kitchens of foreign countries, and the title here reads as a souvenir as much as a formula: what she describes is close to a plain genoise, the whole-egg foam sponge associated with Italian and French professional baking, which became a common base for layered Continental pastry. The equal-weights proportion works as a memory device, and similar proportions turn up in nineteenth-century European and English cookery under various names. The name "Vienna tarts" most likely trades on the city's pastry and coffee-house reputation rather than on a specific Viennese original.