Let there be lightness
In season
My great-aunty Joan was a dab hand at the sponge cake. Here, I’ve updated her 50-plus-year-old recipe to include poached apricots and mascarpone.
Sponge cake with vanilla poached apricots and mascarpone cream
Serves: 8-10 Preparation: 30 minutes Cooking: 20 minutes
Ingredients
■ cup honey
■ 1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise, seeds scraped out with tip of a knife
■ 7-8 ripe apricots, halved, stones removed (substitute with apples or pears, or with canned apricots)
■ 1 tablespoon flour
■ 1 cup cornflour
■ 1 tsp baking powder
■ teaspoon salt
■ 4 eggs, separated
■ cup caster sugar
■ 1 tsp vanilla extract
■ 300ml cream
■ 200g mascarpone
■ Icing sugar to dust
Method
Put the honey, vanilla bean, seeds and 1 cup hot water in a saucepan and stir over a low heat until the honey has dissolved. Add the apricots and simmer gently for 5-10 minutes, or until just tender. Remove apricots and vanilla bean. Set aside.
Boil the syrup on the stovetop over medium heat until reduced by half. Set aside to cool.
Preheat oven to 190C and line 2 x 20cm cake tins with baking paper (don’t butter the sides). Sift the flour, cornflour, baking powder and salt together three times. Set aside.
Whisk the egg whites to stiff peaks then add 2 tablespoons boiling water and whisk well again. Add the sugar, a tablespoon at a time. Whisk well each time.
Add the egg yolks to the egg white mixture and whisk well.
Whisk the egg yolks and vanilla extract together until pale and tripled in volume. Set aside.
Fold the sifted flour mixture into the egg white mixture, folding lightly and evenly to just combine.
Spoon the mixture carefully into the prepared tins, dividing it evenly (weigh them, if you can). Tap the tins gently on the bench to remove any air bubbles, then bake for 20 minutes, or until well risen and starting to shrink away from the edges. Turn onto a wire rack to cool.
To serve, whip the cream, mascarpone and 3 tablespoons of the poaching liquid to a firmpeak. Place one cake on a serving plate and brush 2-3 tablespoons of poaching liquid over the top. Top with poached apricots and spoon the whipped creammix on top.
Brush 2-3 tablespoons of the poaching liquid over the top of the remaining cake, then carefully place upside down on the cream, pressing gently tomake sure it’s level. Dust liberally with icing sugar and serve.
Baker’s note
The trick to achieving a light and fluffy sponge is to sift the flour and other dry ingredients well and use a light hand when combining the ingredients. Use a spatula and ‘‘under, over and through’’ motion when folding in the dry ingredients, as this helps to retain air in the eggs.