Thursday, October 28, 2010

Butter Sponge Cake

The name reminds me of the cake I had eaten a couple of times as a kid,  from a famous bakery by the name Butter Sponge in Bangalore. There is one by the same name now, am not sure if its the same one though.  Naive me had then thought that the vanilla loaf cake was a bread and how amazed I was by the super delicious tasting 'bread'. But back then, in our sleepy hometown, even cakes sold in the bakeries did not hold much appeal as they were too sweet or were slathered with the over sweet, greasy butter cream..aaagh!!! So it was not all that of a pleasure to eat cakes. We would prefer eating the other savory stuff on the few occasions we would eat bakery stuff.... If we can't get fat eating cakes, let us get fat eating puffs... makes sense right?? lol!!

I had bought a baking book from a railway platform while traveling almost 8 years ago. I did not have an oven , but would just read the book now and then. I have baked a couple of cakes from this book before I got seduced by the glossy glamorous books. The author calls this cake a Butter Sponge Cake and I was tempted to try this out to see if the results would be as good as the name sounds. And I must say, though it was not a buttery butter sponge, it made a delicious, wonderfully light textured tea cake.

 

 The good thing about this recipe is its pretty quick and easy. Doesn't need the butter to be at room temperature, no need to cream the butter. So a good recipe for a beginner.


The recipe goes like this

All Purpose Flour (Maida)- 130 grams / 1 Cup
Baking Powder 1 teaspoon
Butter, unsalted  - 56 grams / 1/4 Cup
Sugar - 150 grams / 3/4 Cup (The original recipe uses 1 cup, 3/4 cup sugar tasted just fine)
Egg Yolks - 108 grams / 6 yolks (gulp!!)
Hot Milk- 120 ml / 1/2 Cup
Vanilla Essence - 3/4 teaspoon

 Procedure:  Pre-heat oven to 180 degrees C(375 degrees F). Grease and line an 8'' tin. (I have used a 9'' tin, dunno why I keep doing silly things like this, would have got a better looking cake!!!)

Sieve the flour and baking powder twice. Add the butter and vanilla essence to the hot milk, cover it to keep it hot. In a large bowl, beat the egg yolks till very thick. That would be for about 4-5 minutes on medium high speed with a hand mixer. Add sugar beat till well incorporated about 30 seconds or so on low speed. At this stage check if the milk is still hot, if not heat again and keep it covered.

 Fold in the flour mixture gently and quickly. Stir in the hot milk mixture. Pour into the prepared tin. Bake for about 35-40 minutes or till a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool the cake in the tin on a wire rack for about 10 minutes. Remove the cake from the tin and cool on the rack completely.





  
     
     Doesn't this look pretty??



Vani, my one and only serious-about-baking- friend-near-where-I-live, very generously lent me her stencils among other things. What a fabulous thing for decorating  cakes, specially for artistically challenged folk like me!! Thanks a ton gurl! 

The cake reminded me in a way about the Golden Cake which was also moist apart from being light and delicious. This one was  undoubtedly a lovely tea-cake, light in terms of weight too. Surely a cake worth trying.

This cake is on its way to Champa's Bake-Off .








37 comments:

Sanjeeta kk said...

Love the stencil work on the soft and gorgeous cake.

Aps Kitchen said...

I loved the cake moreover i loved the stencil work on it :)

Vani said...

Wow...the sponge looks amazing!!! :) Am loving the pictures too! The recipe and the process is quite amusing...never seen anything on these lines before with butter added to hot milk n all!
You don't have to thank me gal. Like I said...my entire kitchen is open for you...pl walk in and feel free to use any equipment or anything that can be of use to you. :)

Rookie Qookie said...

Lovely Cake dear and gr8 idea for adding glamour :)

Cheers,
Reshmi

Unknown said...

Hello Suma,
Very lovely cake and absolutely loved the design on the cake. Pls elaborate on how you acheived that effect. It would be great if you post a few pics as well on how u did it.
Thanks,
Indrani.

deepti said...

Perfect Sponge Cake..

Anonymous said...

Wow, I second Vani there...never seen/heard anything quite like this before. Adding butter to hot milk, and ensuring the milk stays hot is a totally new thing for me. Im sure the cake makes for a perfect tea-time cake. Must give it a try sometime.
I love the stencil work! So nice of Vani to lend you her stuff :) I should either have Vani move close to my place or I should move closer to both you guys ;)

Anonymous said...

PS: Butter Sponge (the store) is still around, in V V Puram :)

Champa said...

Lovely crumb texture. Thanks for the entry. I have a set of stencils which I bought but never used (I like doing things myself). It is simply sitting in the cake tools box.

chef and her kitchen said...

wow...this looks just perfect....very very nice color...

ann low said...

What a pretty cake ;D I love butter cake and this looks so yummy :)

Deepti Pawar said...

Interesting cake (with hot milk and all!) and defn. nice stencil work!

I'm guessing there's a Butter Sponge in Malleswaram (15th cross, Near the Ganesha Temple). Back in those days I used to pass it everyday while on my way back from college on my scooty. The wafts of fresh baked oven goodies would make me oh-so-(already)-hungry!!

Will try this recipe sometime!

FewMinute Wonders said...

Thanks for a very different recipe for making sponge cake. I used to love them in India but out here it does not taste the same. Will give yours a try.

Reshmi said...

nice butter cake...looks soft n delicious....i love the work u hve done...

Nitha said...

soft and moist cake.. Love the stencil work.. Can you explain how you did that?

Priya Suresh said...

Super moist cake, love ur stencils work, looks absolutely marvellous..

panchpakwan said...

Looks so yuummy , spongye cake.. and
nice design too!

Pavithra Elangovan said...

Looks super cute and so so spongy ..Loved the recipe as well.

Sushma Mallya said...

looks so moist, love the design of it

♥Sugar♥Plum♥Fairy♥ said...

THis is so pretty and u have some wonderful bakes on ur blog!

Spice said...

Cake looks wonderfully moist....love the stencil work on it, it reminded me of the cupcakes I decorated using stencils & never get to posted them.....

btw thanks Suma for sharing award with me, sorry U didn't get response from me as I was in India, will def. post about it once I get back to normal routine.

Sweet Artichoke said...

A simple and deliciously moist cake! I really like the sugar decoration you put on top of it!

Aparna Balasubramanian said...

Your cake looks so very pretty with the sugar stencilling.

Nithya said...

Beautifully decorated cake. Love it totally :)

Santosh Bangar said...

WONDERFUL CAKE WITH DECORATION SOFT AND PLUFFY CAKE

Santosh Bangar said...

WONDERFUL CAKE WITH DECORATION SOFT AND PLUFFY CAKE

Divya Kudua said...

I love plain cakes too.Contrary to your experience,I lived bang opposite a bakery and they sold the best of cakes I've ever tasted.Be the plain sponge,swiss/jam rolls,cupcakes and pastries,they were the best.I gulped too when I saw 6 egg yolks!!I am somehow apprehensive when it comes to recipes which add more than 4 eggs,silly me.

Love the stencil work done on top.

Shubha said...

cake looks very soft and the decoration looks too good

M D said...

ur cake seems so soft, tempting and delicious :) I have tried ur Golden cake and it was fabulous too. Lovely one with that beautiful work on the top!

Pushpa said...

Cake looks perfect moist and soft looks gorgeous with the decoration on top.

Pushpa @ simplehomefood.com

Nachiketa said...

What a fabulous cake..... could kiss your fingers for this.... looks amazing :)

Cheers,
The Variable, Crazy Over Desserts - Nachiketa
Catch me on facebook @ Crazy Over Desserts

Divya Shankar said...

Hello Suma,
I tried this one out during this extended weekend. I have a note of thanks to you for this on my blog - please read http://furorescribendi.blogspot.com/2011/04/bocuse-dor-i.html

Bona said...

Hi
I followed your recipe and baked one. I don't have a hand mixer so just whisked the egg with a hand-held whisk (arm exercise as well :p)...
Baked it in a heart shaped container...the cake turned out fine...I have uploaded an image at http://bonasatiyaa.blogspot.in/

Unknown said...

Sumaji,

Am Sushmitha new visitor to your blog...read it...like it and baked it.....n viola......result was jus awesome......you rock......

Sushmitha

Unknown said...

wow...super sponge..flat and neat and the stencil work is beautiful

how do u get such flat cakes?
i have a convection microwave and i read somewhere that putting wet towels around the cake pans will give a uniform raise to cake. but im not sure if we can put such damp cloth in the microwave. can we really do that??in microwave convection mode?
And what should we do if the oven turns off due to the power cut and the cake is in the oven?

Suma Rowjee said...

Thank you Harika! You can find this info on my post on preparing pans. Yes, you can put damp cloth on convection mode.

Power cut? God, don't scare me! If that happens nothing much you could do. Curse the supply board, sulk for sometime and bake again :)

Unknown said...

may b a jinx i guess...i never got a success with my red velvet cakes. Whenever the cake gets into the oven, for sure there'll be a power cut.

once i left the cake in the oven for an hour until i got the power back and contiued baking for the remaining time as soon as the power is back.

Cake was still tasty, but was dense :(..infact sooper dense...
Thus making my redvelvet cakes - always disasters.

What would u do ideally do? Pray god...that;s all :( ???