h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Classic Sandwich and Sponge Cakes - A87924108
Author: minorvogonpoet - U3099090

Dmitri suggested I compiled an entry on sponge cakes. When I looked into this, I discovered that most of the light cakes I make are strictly speaking 'sandwich'cakes rather than sponge cakes. I've included both sandwich and sponge cakes in this entry.

Does this entry fit the bill? Do I need to add anything else - butter icing, for example?

Great! This will be an asset to the Edited Guide indeed

I did not know this about 'sponge' so I learned a lot from the Entry - concise and informative

Thanks Sasha.

It's occurred to me that someone might want a photo, and you can't have a photo of a without a !

Good! And now, you can add all the American equivalents for the measurements...

Also an explanation for what caster sugar is. I think it's called 'superfine sugar' here.

By 'electric whisk' do you mean 'electric mixer'?

PS Isn't that a really small cake?

Over here, we usually use about double those ingredients, I think....

Of course my sister says you should always add an extra egg, but that's because she raises chickens. <tongueincheek)

Oh dear, isn't this complicated?

It looks as if caster sugar is unusual in the US. The conversion for 175 grams of granulated sugar is actually 3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons. Do I have to be that precise?

For 175 grams of margarine would 1 1/2 sticks be better?

Do you use centigrade for temperatures in the US?

Would it be 6oz for 175g?

That's what my traditional recipe says, and that makes enough for two 20cm (8in) tins.

This Entry has answered my question about my traditional recipe! It is from old Women's Institute rules for an exhibition cake that was to be displayed unfilled - I always wondered why it was just two sponges with no jam or butter icing filling, but I now know it is because it is the sandwich cake recipe, not just a sponge, and the judging focused only on the cake not on distracting additions

Yes, I think 6 ounces would be about 175 grams - but it's not precise.

Yes, those conversions are a pain.

No, Sasha, ounces won't help. 3/4 cup will be fine, you don't need the tablespoons.

1 1/2 sticks of butter is 3/4 cup. I'd use 3/4 cup.

No, US ovens aren't calibrated in centigrade. 190C is about 375F. Almost all recipes in the US say to bake a cake at 350F until cake is springy to the touch, or until a broomstraw comes out clean.

One small thing: nobody has a 7" cake pan. It's 8" or 10".

This is excellent! We are achieving our goal of being so planetary that everyone on Earth can make our recipes.

This also reminds me of when I was learning Dutch at uni. My instructor was Belgian, and his wife gave me one of her ladies' magazines for practise. I took it home to my mom, who was delighted at the free dress pattern it contained.

So of course, I had to translate the pattern - and convert all the measurements from the metric system. The dress she created was awesome. She got compliments. I got the satisfaction of improving my Dutch.

OK, I've made a few tweaks.

Excellent!

One thing occurred to me while rereading - I think we call a sandwich cake a 'layer cake' over here. Maybe you could slip that in in parentheses or a footnote somewhere, just for search engines? We get a lot of our traffic by direct search, so slipping in the words helps it come up on google.

Yes, it won't be precise conversion, but as long as you work from one set of figures and the proportions are right, then that is all that is needed Eg the self-raising flour is 1 cup in the sponge cake recipe, but that isn't a precise conversion from 90g because it is in proportion with 2/3 cup of sugar

That's it So the British version of 'self-rising flour' is 'self-raising flour'?

Flatt & Scruggs would have had trouble singing about 'self-raising flour':

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxgBycCuqVQ

'Martha White self-rising flour with Hot Rize....'

Thanks Sasha. The proportions are clear enough with metric measurements, but I was losing sight of them with cups.

A very good collection of recipes. The last one sounds like the Biskuit my grandma used to make: 3 eggs, the weight of 3 eggs in sugar, the eggs of 3 eggs in flour and some baking powder.

I have always classified three basic types of cake mixture (which the Americans call "batter" but that just seems wrong because batter is liquid and cake mixtures should be of a "dropping consistency").

1. The Victoria sponge where fat, flour sugar are all the same weight.
2. Plain cakes, where the amount of flour is doubled. (In both cases, the eggs are calculated as 1 egg per 2 oz/50g of the fat/sugar weight.)
3. Angel cake. A mixture which uses no fat - the second one described in the entry.

1 and 2 are called "Rührkuchen" in German. (Stirred cake) You can, and should, beat the hell out of them up to adding the eggs to make a fluffy, airy, almost white mixture. But after adding the flour, only a minimum amount of stirring is necessary, or the cake will sink.

The dropping consistency, by the way, we learnt at school: after adding the flour, you add some liquid - e.g. milk or fruit juice until you can count to 7 before it drops off the spoon.

I'll give it to the Americans on "self-rising flour" though. Self-raising smacks of levitation, or, sacreligiously, of resurrection!

Thanks for the comments.

The traditional method of using eggs when judging the weight of flour, fat and sugar makes sense because it's the proportions that matter.

I've got Good Housekeeping books going back to 1952 (inherited from my mother in law) and they are consistent in saying that

most cakes are made by the creaming method of combining fat and sugar and adding eggs and flour afterwards.

sandwich cakes are made by the creaming method but are characterised by the relatively high amount of fat, which is normally in the same proportion as flour and sugar. Just to confuse everybody, they aren't always made in two cake tins and sandwiched together.

True sponges have little or no fat and are whisked. I think true sponges are relatively rare, and a lot of people use the word 'sponge' to cover sandwich cakes.

Do you think I need to add to or alter the guide entry?

What you just said there about the creaming method and fat might be good background to add. When I was a kid, I baked a lot of cakes for the family because it was fun to muck about in the kitchen in the evening, and it gave my mom a rest.

The first cake recipe I learned said 'creaming method'. I never knew what that meant until now. Thanks for enlightening me. So that's how I made a cake when I was 10.

As far as 'batter' goes, in the US, there's only the distinction between batter and dough, as far as I know. I take your point, though: the consistency of 'batter' can vary a whole lot.