Genoise Sponge Cake - worth making

Have you ever heard of a Genoise Sponge Cake?  Well, I have wondered what it was like for a long time so, I decided that it should be my next bake.  The recipe calls for an 8 inch cake pan and I only had 9 inch so it only seems natural to get onto Amazon and order a new pan.  I bought the Fat Daddio's Anodized Aluminum pans because they come highly recommended.  Seems that they are great pans.

A Genoise Sponge Cake originated in Genoa, Italy.  It is a soft flavorful cake that you can fill with all kinds of wonderful things.  For this cake, I just used my homemade strawberry jam (I seem to be getting a lot of mileage out of that jam) and whipped cream.  I topped it with more cream and fresh strawberries.  It seemed a little dryer than I expected but it was tasty. Just means I'll have to make it again until I perfect it.

This cake uses just a few ingredients but following the directions is important.

**Very important -  your 4 eggs HAVE to be a room temperature

Preheat your oven to 350* and put rack in the center of the oven.

Prepare one 8 inch cake pan by cutting a piece of parchment to fit into the bottom. Spray the pan bottom and edges and then place the parchment in the bottom of the pan and spray it.

First, measure out your dry ingredients using a scale and then sift them together three times- this is important!

1 cup (120 grams) all purpose flour -sift with a fine mesh strainer

2 Tbls (16 grams) cornstarch - add to the sifted flour

1/4 tsp salt add to the flour and cornstarch and sift together three times. Set aside

Melt the butter and set aside to cool so that it is barely warm (you may want to do this while the eggs are beating)

In a mixer bowl add:

4 large eggs at room temperature 

2/3 cup (135 grams) granulated sugar

1 tsp pure vanilla extract (can also use Almond Extract)

Mix together with your mixer until eggs have increased in size and are thick and fluffy  **This is the trick for the sponge.  You have to beat the eggs and sugar on high for 10 minutes.

 

Now, gently fold in the sifted flour mixture.  (I actually sifted it once more into the eggs) Fold it in  with a spatula. Make sure you do not stir and deflate the eggs!

Next, fold in the melted butter just until incorporated being very careful to not

 deflate the cake mixture.

Pour into the prepared pan and put into the oven,  Bake for 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out with a few moist crumbs.

Let cool for 10 minutes and then loosen the edges if needed with a thin sharp knife.  Turn out to finish cooling.

Once it is cooled, slice the cake in half through the middle and add whatever filling you might like. It can be a pastry cream or fruit - use your imagination.

Place the top on, dust with powdered sugar and enjoy!

**Note if you have a cake slicer like the pros use-that would be very helpful to get a clean even cut.  I guess I need to get back onto Amazon. 

I hope you will give a sponge cake a try.  It may seem a bit intimidating, but actually, it was easy and yummy.

Happy Baking!

 

Viennese Whirls

 Again!  What is it with the late post?  Well, maybe I got a little bit distracted?

We had the best time on the Big Island of Hawai'i but that shouldn't be an excuse.  My goal was to make something every month.  I finished these cookies at 9:45 thelast night of the month, April 30th-so I met my goal-I just didn't get it posted until now, May 2, 2025. So here we go!

Have you ever heard of a Viennese Whirl? It's a butter cookie made into a sandwich.  I was worried it would be a bit like the cookies I made for Valentine's Day but it's not. (I liked those better) These are an

easy cookie to make but not a great choice for someone who is right handed and has some arthritis happening in said right hand.  Squeezing these out of that little bag was hard and they really don't look great.  But, they do taste pretty tasty.

The dough is easy to mix together.  It's just butter and powdered sugar that you beat hard for 5 minutes.  It has some vanilla, all purpose flour, and cornstarch, and maybe a little tiny bit of milk.  That's it-no eggs.

The trick comes in making them look pretty with a star tip and piping bag.  

Draw 2 inch circles on the back of your parchment and then you know where to pipe.  My circles were a bit larger than 2 inches so I piped inside the circle and it seamed to work.  Refrigerate for 10 minutes and then bake at 355*.  Let them cook completely on the cookie sheet and then remove with a spatula.

Frost with the buttercream and add some jam. Top with the other cookie and there you go.  Sprinkle with a bit of powdered sugar is always a great addition.  But not before I took a bite.  They really are quite tasty.

Would I make these again? Probably!  Would I let Mike squeeze them into the circles? YES!  My poor hand was killing me by the time I finished. I hope you will give them a try.  And remember, weighing your ingredients helps to give you consistency.  Get a scale, it really is best to weigh instead of measure.

Viennese Whirls

250 g unsalted butter at room temp (I used salted butter)

3/4 c (105 g) powdered sugar

1 tsp (5 g) vanilla extract

1 1/2 c (225 g) all purpose flour

1/2 c (68 g) cornstarch

**Note here, my dough was so stiff that I added about 1 tbls milk to help and it worked great

Filling

125 g (1/2 c) unsalted butter (or salted)

1 1/2 c (210 g) powdered sugar

1/2 tsp (3 g) vanilla extract

1 Tbls milk - more if needed

raspberry/strawberry jam

Preheat oven to 355*

Line baking sheets with parchment paper that you have drawn two inch circle on the back

In an electric mixer mix the butter until well mixed and then add the powdered sugar and vanilla.  Beat hard for about 5 minutes, scraping the edges a couple times in that 5 minute period, or until it is light in color and light in texture.

Sift the flour and cornstarch into the butter and mix with mixer or by hand.  Add a little milk if it's too stiff-the dough should be soft but not loose

Put the dough into a piping bag that has been fitted with a large star tip.  Squeeze dough into the circles starting at the outside and coming into the middle.  Lift up and move to the next circle.

Put in the refrigerator while you do the next baking sheet.

Bake the first sheet for 10 minutes or until no raw dough is left and edges are just starting to brown.

Let cool on the pan.  

Remove and pair up the cookies with like sizes.  Spread or pipe the buttercream onto one cookie, add jam and top with the other cookie.  Dust with powdered sugar.

*Note, you can store cookies in the refrigerator for up to 5 days if they last that long!

Keep Baking!

Biscuit Week Meets Valentine's Day

 On the Great British Baking Show, they always have a biscuit week.  The challenges are fun and I thought I should give one of the recipes a try.  A"biscuit" in Great Britain is a hard, thin, and crispy cookie that has a snap and is sometimes filled with something yummy. By definition, it's sweet, crumbly and sometimes buttery.  So this week/month, as my tribute to our friends across the pond, I made Paul Hollywood's Jammy Biscuits.  They are easy to make, BUT they take some time.  Delicious is an understatement. You'll have to give them a try and let me know what you think.

Because everyone, but us American's, use grams instead of cups, I am putting the recipe at the bottom of this post in both grams and measurements for those who don't want to figure out the conversions.  But, remember, it's better to weigh the ingredients than to measure them.  Just sayin!

Cream the butter and sugar together and beat for 3-5 minutes in your stand mixer.  Add the vanilla and eggs and beat until creamy. (*Note, I added half vanilla and half almond extract) Remove from the mixer and stir the flour and cornstarch in by hand.  It will be on the crumbly side but that's okay.  Pour it out onto a floured surface and gently work it with your hands to make a soft dough. Don't overwork it.

Divide the dough in half and then in half again so you have four equal sizes and form them each into a disc.  Wrap east disc in plastic wrap and place in your refrigerator to chill for 20 minutes.

After 20 minutes, remove one disc and roll it out to about the thickness of a nickel - because this was my first time making these, (and I WILL make them again) some may have been a little thicker and some a little thinner.  It's a learning process!

I cut them with a 3 inch fluted cookie cutter.  Paul says to use a 2 3/4 inch but I didn't have one that size.

Place on a cookie sheet that has been lined with parchment paper and put back into the refrigerator for another 20 minutes. You want half of your biscuits to be plain and the other half to have a cutout of your choice in it.  I chose hearts for Valentine's Day!

After 20 minutes in the refrigerator, place them in a 325* oven for 10-12 minutes.  Keep an eye on them so they don't get too brown but you want them to start to barely brown around the edges.  Mine actually baked for 14 minutes but it will be different for each oven, so watch them.

Let them cool on the pan for 5 minutes (I know, you will be setting your timer over and over and over).  Remove to a cooling rack and let cool the rest of the way.

Once they are cooled they are ready to assemble.

Before hand, dust the tops with a generous amount of powdered sugar.  You want them to really look beautiful!

Next, frost the bottoms of the plain biscuit with a little bit of the buttercream and then top that with your favorite jam. You can use raspberry, lemon curd, apricot preserves or strawberry jam.  I used strawberry.

After you spread the jam, carefully top with a powdered sugar biscuit with the cutout.  Look how cute these are.  I took them to the office where I volunteer today and the ladies went a little crazy.  There was not one soul who didn't rave about how yummy they are. 

Happy Valentine's Day and Happy Biscuit Week!  

Paul Hollywood's Jammy Biscuits

(this is a double batch because I needed more than 12 biscuits)

240 grams unsalted butter softened  -  1 cup

240 grams sugar  - 1 cup

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

430 grams all purpose flour - 3 1/2 cups

50 grams cornstarch - 1/2 cup

Buttercream

1/2 cup softened butter

1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

1 tsp vanilla

Mix the butter until fluffy, sift in the powdered sugar and add the vanilla.  Mix until thick and fluffy. I did add about 1 tsp of whipping cream to help bring it together.  It will be thick.

Mix the butter and sugar until fluffy - about 3-5 minutes in your stand mixer.  Add the eggs and the vanilla and mix until well blended.  Remove from the stand mixer and stir in the flour and cornstarch (mix these together with a whisk) until almost mixed- it will be crumbly.  Pour out onto a lightly floured surface and gently work with your hands into a soft dough.  Do not overwork.  Divide in half and then divide each half in half again. (*Note, if you are making half this recipe, only divide the dough in half)

Form each piece into a disc and wrap in plastic wrap.  Put in the refrigerator to chill for 20 minutes. 

After chilling your dough, remove one disc and roll out to about the thickness of a nickel.  Cut with a fluted cookie cutter and place each biscuit onto a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Rework the dough scraps and cut more until you have 12 bottoms.  Put back into the refrigerator to chill for another 20 minutes.  Remove another disc and repeat the process, except, with these you want to cut a shape into the center of the biscuit.  It can be any shape for any holiday that you want. Put the solid biscuit onto the cookie sheet and then cut the shape out.  Save the dough and use it to make a few extra biscuits. Put them in to chill.

Meanwhile, preheat your oven to 325*

Bake the first sheet of biscuits for 10-12 minutes watch them so they don't get overly baked.  You want the edges to just begin to brown.  Remove from the oven and let cool on the cookie sheet for 5 minutes.  Remove to a cooling rack and cool the rest of the way.

Dust the tops with a generous amount of powdered sugar.  Assemble the biscuits by spreading a dollop of the butter cream on the plain biscuit and then top with your choice of jam.  Add the top biscuit.  What a delightful treat.

Keep on Baking!

A New Beginning

It's been years since I have posted on this blog.  I guess I got busy, or maybe just needed something different in my life.  I'm not really sure, but I'm back.   I love to bake.  And when I bake, I like to eat.  So, I try not to bake too much and I fail miserably.  When Mike and I returned from our mission, I started watching The Great British Bakeoff (thanks to a couple of my friends who love that show).  As I watched, I started to have a desire to try my had at new, and maybe a little complicated, baked goods. And so, here I am, starting again!  This blog will contain some fun recipes I've been eyeing.  Some are easy! Some are hard!  And some, I may have to try more than once.  There are other recipes, besides baked goods, that I will post-favorites of ours that you might like to try.  Stay with me!  Bear with me! And here we go!

Have you ever heard of Clotted Cream?  Who doesn't love that name? Well, it's a little bit of heaven on a scone.  The Brits love it and I think people who have visited Great Britain love it.  I've always wondered what it was so I did some searching on Pinterest and found that clotted cream is not hard to make, it just takes time - a lot of time.  Basically, it's cream that has been cooked all night at a low temperature, then refrigerated for 12 hours, and then separated from the whey that is left behind.  It's supposed to have a butter like consistency.  Mine didn't turn out quite like that and I almost tried it again, but then, I decided it was good enough and went with it.

Start by preheating your oven to 180* and then measure out 2 cups of heavy whipping cream.  Add to a glass pan that is large enough that the cream is 1 1/2 to 2 inches deep. 

The recipe I used said to cover with foil.  When mine didn't work the way I thought it would, I looked at other recipes and they did not cover their cream.  So you can decide what to do. Put the pan in the oven and let it stay for 12 hours.  DO NOT open the door.  Now this is tricky.  Some ovens shut themselves off if left on too long.  You do not want that to happen.  Mine did.  Mike checked it at 4:30 in the am (who is up at that hour???) and the oven was on, when I went out to pull it from the oven-the oven was off.  It was still warm, and I still needed hot pads to remove it but maybe that's why it didn't work right. Your guess is as good as mine.

This is the way it is supposed to look.  Once you remove it from the oven, let it sit to cool to room temperature.  Then put it in the refrigerator for 12 hours.  

At the end of 12 hours you can remove the clotted cream from the whey left at the bottom of the pan.  Simply start lifting it from one corner to expose the liquid below and then tip the pan up and let the whey run into a bowl.  Hold onto that whey because you can use it in other baking.  In fact, I used a bit in the scones. YUM!  And that's story about clotted cream.  It is not sweetened but with strawberry jam, oh my.

Bring on the scones.  When I started thinking about the recipes I wanted to try, I kept coming back to scones.  They look a little like the baking powder biscuits that I make but they are not the same.  Scones in America are much different than scones in Great Britain and I was anxious to try them.  I looked at recipe after recipe but I wanted to follow Paul Hollywood's recipe.  Do you know Paul Hollywood?  Well, he is one of the judges on the show and he is quite the baker himself.  I had a recipe but wanted to watch him in action.  So, I went to YouTube and there he was in good form.  He mixed the dough with his hands and

so that is what I did.  Here are the steps. First, preheat your oven to 425*

First of all, weigh your ingredients instead of measuring them.  The recipe below is measured in grams and milliliters.

Measure out the flour, using strong flour, or bread flour to us Americans.  Add cold butter cut into cubes.

Begin mixing with your fingers.  You want to break up the butter until it looks like breadcrumbs!

Keeping breaking up the butter.  You don't want any big pieces.

Next, add the sugar and the baking powder.  Mix with your hands to incorporate it.

Crack the eggs into the flour and mix with your hands.  It gets really messy but feels so good.

Add the milk and continue to mix with your hands.  It will be sticky and that's how you want it.

Dump it onto a floured board!

You don't want to knead the dough, but you do want to fold it over itself about 6-7 times.

Pat into a circle!

Roll to about 1 or 1 1/2 inches thick.

Cut your scones.  I don't have a round cutter so I used a glass.  The round cutters are better if you have one.

Lay the scones on parchment paper and put in the oven for 15 minutes.  

15 minutes is about perfect.  I pulled mine out about 30 seconds early.

Move them to a rack to cool.  Look at the height of those babies.  

Let the scones cool a bit.  I was in such a hurry that my clotted cream ran down the sides.  Maybe that is because it is on the runny side but it may have done better if the scone was cooled more.  Can you believe how pretty that is?  

And if you could just reach through the screen for a bite-oh my goodness- you would think you were in heaven.  Such a fun and really easy recipe.  Hopefully, when you feel adventurous, you will give it a try.

Until next time, Keep on baking!

 

Clotted Cream

2 cups heavy cream

Preheat oven to 180 *

Place 2 cups heavy cream into a glass pan. Place in oven and leave for 12 hours.  Remove from the oven and let sit until cooled to room temperature.  Cover with plastic wrap and carefully move to the refrigerator.  Leave for 12 hours.  Separate the clotted cream from the whey in the bottom of the pan.  You can lift one corner back and then tip the pan and let the whey drain into a bowl. Save the whey for use in other recipes (can be used instead of milk) The brownish layer on top is normal and you just mix it into your clotted cream.  It gives great flavor. The clotted cream should be the consistency of butter.

Store the clotted cream in a jar for up to a week. 

Paul Hollywood's Scones

500 grams strong white flour or bread flour
80 grams unsalted butter - cold and cut into small squares

80 grams sugar

5 tsp baking powder

2 eggs

250 ml milk

For the egg wash

1 egg mixed well

Preheat oven to 425*

Put flour in a bowl and add the cold butter cubes.  With clean hands, mix the butter into the flour breaking up the large pieces of butter until the flour and butter resembles bread crumbs.  Add in the sugar and the baking powder and mix with your hand until incorporated.  Add the eggs right into the bowl and mix with your hands and then add the milk mixing until all the flour is mixed in.  Dump out onto a floured board and fold the dough over itself about 6-7 times.  Do not work too much or the scone will be dense.  Clean off your hands as best as you can before you fold the dough.  Pat into a circle. Wash your hands and then roll into a circle about 1- 1 1/2 inches thick. Cut into scones and place on parchment paper.  Bake for 15 minutes.  (should be perfect timing)

Remove from oven and move to a cooling rack.  Cool.  Eat while still warm.  Serve with clotted cream and strawberry jam. Delish