SLUBBER! I know you're around.....

[Poledra]

...please can you come and help me with my sponge cakes? I have tried numerous recipes, but always seem to end up with something that you could use as a safety mat in a playground . Hey, the kids still eat it, mind.

Anyway, could it be my crap oven that prevents my sponge cakes from becoming the soft pillows of loveliness I know they should be? Or is there something else I need to know? As Queen of the High Sift, I know you will have the answer.

www.lakeland.co.uk/oven-thermometer/F/product/11235?src=gpute&sq=oven%20thermometer

I clicked as I mistook your title for that kids crafting stuff my DD loves & wondered why it was in food

but I bake, so whilst I'm here will reply anyway, even if your not asking me

www.lakeland.co.uk/oven-thermometer/F/product/11235?src=gpute&sq=oven%20thermometer

YES it is possibly your oven to blame if its not heating up to the correct temperature, then cakes are less likely to rise correctly, maybe investing in something like in the link above & testing it, BEFORE the expense of a new oven might be a better idea though...you will find them in stores too,

otherwise it will be something in your mix, or mixing technique(I prefer weighing my eggs & then equal amounts of butter, sugar & flour(sifting high as you mention)) & starting off with a whisk for the sugar & eggs, & then move onto a wooden spoon for adding the rest....

mine rise fine every time, so I suppose I must be doing something right

.....how did that happen

:o at high sift

ooh, while we're doing "sponge for dunces" can I ask how to stop mine being quite so pointy? it makes forming the sandwich very tricky. or is everyone else just shaving theirs?

After cooking I usually sit a bowl, other cake tin or something on top of mine whilst its cooling, that helps flatten it back down for icing,

it would probably work okay for sandwiching too, though personally I usually make a deeper sponge & then slit it for those

Thaks for the reply, rockin' - d'you think my 'getting-helped-by-a-minimum-of-2-children mixing technique may also be at fault then?

Will give the oven thermometer a go, thank you - I absolutely hate this oven, 'tis definitely a triumph of style over substance.

My guess would be that you aren't beating the sugar/butter mix enough. You want to be beating it with an electric beater for a good 5 mins - time it, it's easy to underestimate - so that it is very pale cream in colour and fluffy. This the the part in which you get the most air into the mix, doesn;t matter how high you sift from, if there isn't enough air to start with then you won't get a fluffy cake.

Other top tips:
You can still use electric beaters to mix the egg in but only beat enough to mix each egg/spoonful of flour in.

The remaining flour should, technically, be folded in using a metal spoon so you don;t beat out all the air you added at the beginning.

Don't let the mixture stand in the bowl while you grease the tin as the baking powder starts to react with the moisture which could stop it rising as well.

How old is your flour and how long has it been open? SR flour that's near its sell by date or that's been open for a while doesn't rise as well as a fresh bag.

Charlotte, the hump in the middle is usually due to the outside of the cake cooking too quickly so the centre rises higher than the edges. You can buy special strips called Bake Even Strips that cool the outside of the tin slightly and stops it happening, or you could try turning the oven down slightly and cooking for a bit longer. It's a common issue with fan ovens because the heat is fiercer than in conventional ovens. Can you turn the fan off on your oven and see if that helps?

sorry Poldera only just saw this.

yes what LadyD said

I do my sponges in the conventional oven setting rather than fan. It's a bit gentler and you don't get a pointy top.

Everything at room temp before you start is important.

sorry for not responding yesterday. I wasn't ignoring you promise.

Hello, Slubber, I'm in my Regency guise atm so you won;t recognise me .

Oh no

I hate this

I am so crap at working out who people are.

Are you the same person who I didn't know who you were yesterday?

Well I've just learnt something there too Ladies, thank you :)

My cakes are mostly fine with my fan on, but your explanation about middle cooking quicker & so making a cake "pointy DOES explain why I do sometimes have this happen,

I've just realised it only happens with 1 particular cake tin, I hadn't thought of that until now.... so the same principal as regards heat will no doubt apply :)

Nope

Fellow Cestrian and cake maker.

Oooooooooooh

I know you.

Hooray!

I made that far too easy for you.

Yes you did.

You should have left it at cake maker and then I would have been perplexed for a good while longer.

I've just clocked your namechange and read it as SlubberIsNotGettingENOUGH . I thought that was a bit personal - not sure what it says about me .

Yes, all good on that front thankyouverymuch

I've known for some time where your mind lies my dear.

Electric Hook Up, yes? Not a slight on poor MrSlubber.

Forgot to come back and say thank you for the reply, Slubber (and LadyD, though I have no idea who you are when in this century!). I have a birthday cake to make on Friday, so I'll give it a go then (have got oven thermometer now) and report back (though I will ahve the assistance of my MIL, who is a master cake baker but also hates my oven with a passion ).

Now, this electrical hook-up thingy - DH is trying to persuade me to go camping with the DCs this summer. I quite liked the idea of an electrical hook-up - DH abhors it and feels it would mark us out as Not Real Campers (which I freely admit I am not, while he probably is). D'you think our marriage can survive this??

There are many different ways to cook sponge cakes recipe. We have a number of great recipes for sponge cakes that are easy to make. Here i explained one of them.

Ingredients

* INGREDIENTS
* 250g Self-raising flour
* 250g Buttter
* 250g Caster Sugar
* 3 Eggs

Method

* 1. Pre-heat the oven at 180C.
  2. Cream butter and icing sugar.
  3. Add eggs beating in one at a time.
  4. Sieve the flour into the mixture and beat.
  5. Fill two 20cm tins halfway.
  6. Put into the center of oven and bake for 30
  minutes.

Ah Poldera, a cake & camping crossover thread. I am in my mn venn diagram topics utopia

No your marriage will not survive this. I'm surprised you've lasted this long tbh having such diametrically opposite tent electrical opinions. Let him camp properly and happily sans the evil orange wire and you should just buy a caravan.

If you get EHU that's where you'll end up. Took friends of our less than 12 months. Last summer they bought a fridge requiring electricity for their tent, now they have a caravan. Slippery slope I tell you. Slippery slope.

See, Slubber, this thread just proves that you are the Sponge Queen (no matter what Nickelbabe may think)

How long will it take me to slide so far down the slippery slope that I end up at a holiday cottage, or even hotel, Slubber? Coz I reckon that's where I'd rather be..........

Lol SoMuch

Poldera have you camped before? You never know you might really like it. One of the joys for me it that it is totally NOT like being at home, there is no stuff to endlessly tidy (or at least very little) or floors with food on or bathrooms that need cleaning. It is very liberating, truly.

I do holiday cottages OR moderately basic camping in a tent. Can't see the point of anything in between tbh. The more shite you take camping the more it feels like being stuck in a small version of your own home.

Horses for courses though. Plenty of the lovely camping folk take HUUUUUUUUGE amounts of god knows what and have a great time.

If you hate camping then no amount of electrical gadgets in your tent is going to improve the experience for you imo.

I have camped when it was just me and DH, and we bascially ate out every night and drank shedloads of wine. And that was in a two-man pup tent, and DH has promised a proper tent that we can actually stand up in (well, he'd have to, to get 5 of us in!).

I'm concerned about cooking with 3DDs between 3 and 7 years old. Would I have to shop every day for fresh stuff (I have a plug-in coolbox, y'see - an EHU would sort that out)?

We will end up doing it, and the DDs will looooooooove it I'm sure. I guess I have to keep reminding myself that I will have time in the evenings to sit and read once the DDs are in bed, with having nothing else to do