But one day, I decided to change this and I bought a specific pan for this cake that I put on a shelf for its turn. With all the crazy daily things that I do, I almost forgot about this pan on the shelf and found it back only half a year later. Does it sounds familiar to you as well?
Well, there are several reasons why I did not adventure myself in making this cake:
- it requires only egg whites and a lot of them. I always have a problem in splitting the egg yolks from the whites and conserve one ore another in the fridge because is rarely that I bake 2 cakes on the same day. If I put them in the fridge, in most of the cases I forget about them.
I had then to find a pair of recipes that work together with this recipe. I did find one good pair. Recently, I suddenly felt that I want to bake more tarts. For tarts, I need a curd, and for curds, I need yolks. Problem solved. - it is requires a special pan. The special pan is there for a reason. This cake needs to stick to the walls. Yes, unlike other cakes, this one benefits from sticking. It also has to cool upside down so it does not fall during this time.
- it is a difficult cake. I found plenty of recipes with this cake and the variation in the proportions between ingredients was quite big. Which one to pick? Wich one would work for me?
- it contains a lot of sugar. My struggle with cakes is to reduce the amount of sugar. Why? For healthy reasons. Yes, I have a sweet tooth but I have my favourites sweets when I am craving sugar. A sponge cake with a lot of sugar in it is not between them. Unfortunately, like meringues, the structure of this cake is also sustained by sugar. Lowering the amount will result in a cake failure. I had then to find a recipe that would work for me. I picked one from the web and I was disappointed with the result. Instead of just picking up another recipe, I started looking for some principles: how much flour, egg and sugar and what proportion between them. I then went to build my own recipe.
This cake does not rise much in the oven but conserves a beautiful airy structure made during the egg white foaming. This cake keeps its shape while cooling, it is very soft and delicious.
My children simple fell in love with it and I had then to repeat it several times.
Although sweet, it is not extremely sweet.
Ingredients:
- 375g egg white (from ~11 eggs)
- 275g sugar (fine/powdered)
- 2 tablespoons of lemon juice
- a pinch of salt
- 1 tablespoon of vanilla essence
- 150g all-purpose flour (sifted)
Directions:
- Beat the egg whites until they foam well. I used a standing mixer at a high speed for this step.
- If you do not have very fine sugar or powdered sugar, use regular sugar and grind it. Add the sugar, one spoon at a time, while the mixer is still foaming the egg whites.
- Add also 2 tablespoons of fresh lemon juice, the vanilla essence and a pinch of salt. The juice and the salt will strengthen a bit the meringue.
- When finished, reduce the speed of the mixer to the minimum and add the sifted flour. Mix only until the flour is incorporated or you can finish this step by hand. Mixing more will deflate the composition.
- Pour this composition in the special pan. Do not oil the walls or the bottom. It is supposed to stick and this is exactly what you want. Level the top with a spatula.
- Bake at 180ºC for 40 minutes. Check that is cooked by inserting a thermometer inside: if it reached 90-95ºC it means that it is properly cooked inside.
- Let it cool upside down completely to room temperature.
- When cooled, detach the cake from the pan using a long knife.
- You may want to glaze it or just to sprinkle some powdered sugar on top.
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