Time with Cynthia: Chocolate Sponge Cake

As requested by many, here's the recipe to a good chocolate sponge cake. This recipe is from Richard Goh, my favourite instructor for baking. This recipe calls for really simple ingredients but requires precision in terms of getting the batter whisked to the right stage of 'doneness'. 

I love this recipe as it's manageable when done right and it's perfectly soft when handled right. 

Even though this is merely a sponge cake, I'd term this as a bake with difficulty level 3 out of 5 as many fail to get the right doneness for the whisking of the batter, resulting in a kueh-like dense sponge cake. So do read on for tips! (:

Chocolate Sponge Cake Recipe

This recipe yields a 7" round cake

Ingredients:

4 eggs (60g medium sized eggs)

100g fine sugar

90g plain flour

10g cocoa powder

85g melted butter

This recipe allows for a thick cake that can be easily cut into 3 layers for cakes. However, if you'd like a larger cake, this recipe works perfectly fine for 8" or 9" tins with the same amount of batter. You'll just yield a thinner cake and depending on your skill, you can still slice the 9" cake into 3 perfect layers.

Cake flour can also be used in place of plain flour to make the cake softer. I'd usually use 55-60g Seng Choon eggs. The fresher the eggs the better the cake. 

Steps:

Preheat the oven to 160 degree Celsius. Melt the butter. I did this in 10 second intervals in the microwave oven on medium heat. Alternatively, you can double boil the butter to melt it.

Grease and line the cake tin with baking paper.

The flour.

Add the cocoa powder.

Sift the combination.

The 4 eggs and sugar. Do whisk this mixture as soon as you crack the eggs so that the mixture is still fresh. Else, the cake may shrink a lil' after cooling. Don't ask me why.. it just happens! 

Whisk the sugar and eggs on high.

Continue whisking.

Whisk the sugar and eggs on high.

Whisk the eggs and fine sugar till you get almost stiff peaks. You should be able to see tracks in the batter. This usually takes 6-7 minutes on maximum speed using my Philips hand held mixer when I tilt my bowl for maximum access to the batter. It should take about 10-15 minutes on a stand mixer. 

THIS TIMING IS ONLY A GAUGE. 

Please determine if the batter is right by eye power. The video shows you the folding of the batter and also the right stage the batter should be whisked till. Do not leave your batter unattended while you run some other errands. Else, the batter will turn watery with time. 

Fold in the flour and melted butter like this:

You should get a well-folded batter.

Pour the batter into the baking tin. Bake for 25 - 30 minutes or till skewer/toothpick comes out clean from the middle of the cake. 

Invert and peel off baking paper before flipping cake back into position (while cake is still hot)! To prevent the cake from losing its moisture, you can store it in a cake caddy, opening it once in a while to allow the hot air to escape. 

Do keep the cake covered in a cake caddy at all times before the assembly of the cake to prevent drying of the cake leading to a harder, tougher, drier sponge cake.

Have fun baking your chocolate sponge cake! 

I'd love to see the bakes or stuff you've cooked using the blog's recipe! Do share photos of stuff you've baked or cooked using the blog's recipe with me either via FB message to http://facebook.com/limcynthia OR http://facebook.com/thebakingbiatch OR via email at cynthia.lim.hl@gmail.com! I look forward to hearing from you! (: