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 .