We’ve all been there. You’re on your second binge of The Great British Baking Show, and you start to think to yourself, “you know, I think I could do that!” So when the time comes for you to host a tea, bridal/baby shower, Victorian wedding, or are just in the mood to bake something more than the recipe off the back of a box, you get the courage to channel your best Mary Berry. This week we attempted to make raspberry and cream genoise sponge tea cakes. Mouth drooling already? Yeah, us too.
The recipe that we used was from our handy dandy notebook, otherwise known as “Vintage Tea Party” by Carolyn Caldicott. This book has everything you need to know about the origins of high tea and some of the most classic drinks and finger foods commonly served. The recipe is pretty simple. However, the challenge with this dessert is in the sponge. Genoise sponge is not for the beginner baker as we quickly learned. Although it seems easy on the surface, it requires precision, good timing, and gentleness. It’s all centered around the air you create when you whip the eggs and sugar. So when you go to “fold” in the flour and butter, you have to be very careful not to get rid of all the volume you so diligently created.
Even though they didn’t turn out as perfectly as we would have liked, we are proud that we attempted them! They may not be good enough to win the respect of Paul Hollywood, but we’re pretty sure they’re good enough to win over your friends! What we loved the most about this dessert is that you can change the jam and fruit accents depending on the occasion. Say you want to make these for a baby shower. You can use raspberry or strawberry for a girl or blueberry for a boy! Say you want to make them for a Harry Potter themed tea (we can only dream). You can use raspberry for Gryffindor, lime for Slytherin, lemon for Hufflepuff, and blueberry for Ravenclaw (ok, seriously why is this not a thing). Clearly, it’s a very customizable treat and would be sure to impress any party goer you may have.
First step is to measure your parchment paper. Our favorite way to do that is to lay out a square of paper that’s about 2″ bigger than your pan on all sides.
The next step is to then cut the corner of your parchment paper diagonally towards the pan. This way it will be able to fold inside easily.
Next, you add three eggs with 110g/4oz of caster sugar. You will whisk these for about 10 minutes until a thick and creamy batter forms. You want to be able to leave a trail with your whisk.
Once you’ve mastered the whisking, you will then “fold” (very important) 110g/4oz of flour and 2 tablespoons of butter.
Once your flour and butter are incorporated into the batter (good luck), you will pour the batter into your pan. It will cook for about 10 minutes at 400F.
Once it is baked, let the sponge cool. You will then be able to cut out roughly (literally, for us) 2″ circles. Then begins the assembly. Again, we chose to use a raspberry jam with a basic whipped cream.
To finish them off, we sprinkled some powdered sugar over the top!
We would absolutely love to hear from any of those who have been more successful with the Genoise sponge and any tips you may have! If you are one of us who somewhat struggled to make a sponge that wouldn’t get chopped, we’d love to wallow with you.
Happy baking, fellow aspirational baking champions!
