When my beloved grandchildren arrived at the dacha last year, they immediately requested an impromptu housewarming party. There was no oven in our country house, and the pancakes didn’t look much like a birthday cake. It was then that a lifesaver recipe “Sponge cake in a frying pan” was found on the Internet, we immediately tried to bake it, and were delighted!
The hostess always has all the ingredients in the refrigerator. The taste of the sponge cake is tender, not dry, high, porous with an amazing creamy vanilla aroma. Since then I haven’t called it anything other than a “miracle.” Now I cook this delicacy in the city, in my home kitchen. You can serve it sprinkled with powdered sugar or divide it into cake layers, coat it with your favorite cream and decorate with fresh berries.
Now I will tell you a couple of secrets of its preparation, then you will succeed 100%. Firstly, the lid must have a hole for steam to escape. Secondly, try not to open it ahead of time, then the biscuit will not fall off.
What is a biscuit?
It belongs to the universal confectionery baked goods. Many cakes are made using biscuits. Moreover, they are often used to prepare various rolls and cakes.
There are millions of varieties of biscuits. They are sometimes made fluffy and sometimes dense. To prepare them, you can use butter, cream, nuts, and carrots. But the cooking technology is always the same.
Any biscuit dough must include eggs. Moreover, they need to be thoroughly beaten and only then carefully add the remaining ingredients to them. It is thanks to the air that is added during beating that the dough then rises.
What happens when you bake a sponge cake in a frying pan without an oven? When heated, the air increases in volume, so the dough rises. Simultaneously with this process, the walls of the pores with air become solid, as they undergo heat treatment. That, in fact, is the whole secret.
To prepare a delicious sponge cake, you need to thoroughly beat the eggs, add the remaining ingredients, do not lose air and choose the right temperature.
Subtleties of cooking
The quality of the biscuit is determined mainly by the quality of the proteins. You can beat them into a strong, stable foam if:
- use exclusively fresh eggs;
- choose the largest ones, which contain more protein;
- carefully separate the yolks from the whites;
- use only clean and dry dishes for whipping (if there is even a drop of fat on the walls, all the work will go down the drain;
- You can beat the egg whites efficiently by placing the bowl in which they are beaten in a bowl with ice, cold water or snow;
- You can improve whipping with salt, a small amount of citric acid or lemon juice.
It is necessary not to be lazy in sifting the flour - with this simple action it is enriched with oxygen and additionally loosened, which will make the dough more fluffy. If you simply sprinkle the sponge cake with powdered sugar, it can be eaten immediately after baking. But in order to use it to make culinary masterpieces, cut it, etc., you first need to let it dry slightly (at least for 4-8 hours). It is most convenient to bake the biscuit dough in the evening, and assemble the cakes from the cake layers after 12-24 hours. Then it will not crumble, will not get wet during impregnation and will retain its shape. It is better to cut sponge cakes into layers using fishing line or a knife.
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Cooking process
Below is a detailed description of how to cook a sponge cake in a frying pan without an oven with a photo:
- First of all, you need to beat the eggs in a deep bowl. Before doing this, do not forget to add sugar to them. It is better to beat the eggs with a mixer, then it is more likely that the dough will rise well.
- Next, you need to melt the margarine or butter well and place it in the same deep bowl.
- Mix baking powder with flour and mix all ingredients. Moreover, you need to add the dry ones to the liquid ones, and not vice versa. That's all, now you can bake the cake.
- Line the bottom of the pan with parchment paper. Carefully pour the dough into it. Place the frying pan on low heat. The main point is the closed lid. This is a must.
You can check the cake for doneness using a wooden skewer.
Bakery
When baking a sponge cake for a cake in a pan, proceed as follows:
- The dough is poured into the mold. Place in a large saucepan with a plate on the bottom. Cover the mold with a lid wrapped in a towel. The large saucepan is also covered with a lid.
- Place it on the divider if you are preparing a biscuit in a pan on a gas stove. This will help prevent the dough from burning. Bake for 50 minutes on the lowest heat. If you cook a biscuit in a saucepan on an electric stove, do without a divider. In the first half hour, it is not recommended to touch the improvised device, much less move it.
- After the allotted time (50 minutes), gradually open the large lid, then the small one, and check the readiness of the biscuit using a toothpick. The top of the cake should be white, not “toasted”; there will be a golden brown crust on the sides.
- The sides of the cooled biscuit are trimmed with a knife and removed from the mold.
Cut the cake in half lengthwise, soak it in coffee, spread it with cream, assemble and decorate.
Chocolate pie
There is one not very pleasant feature of biscuits - it is not always possible to beautifully cut them into several layers. But if you prepare a chocolate sponge cake for a cake in a frying pan, you can simply bake several thin cake layers. One side is glossy and slightly sticky, while the other is lighter and smoother.
What you will need:
- Three eggs.
- Half a liter of kefir.
- Four hundred grams of sugar.
- Melted butter - one hundred grams.
- A teaspoon of slaked soda.
- A little more than half a kilo of flour.
- Cocoa powder – one hundred and thirty grams.
How to prepare a tall and tender sponge cake for the holiday?
Some housewives bake this sponge cake in a pan for the holiday table, using it with different creams. The results are completely different cakes, to the delight of guests and household members. To bake a simple, fluffy sponge cake according to the recipe described below, you will need:
- For the dough: 12 chicken eggs, two cups of sugar, two cups of flour, 1-2 teaspoons of vanilla sugar.
- For impregnation: 0.5 cups of water, two tablespoons of sugar, one tablespoon of cognac (optional).
It is recommended to bake in an aluminum pan with a diameter of 16-18 cm. If you cook on an electric stove, it is recommended not to place the pan on direct heat; it is better to place a heated iron sheet or a large-diameter cast-iron pan under it. The fire is reduced to low. The bottom of the pan is covered with parchment, the lid is wrapped in a towel. The pan is not lubricated with anything.
How to cook?
Preparing a chocolate sponge cake in a frying pan without an oven is quite quick. Preparing one cake layer will not take more than ten minutes, so you can have time to bake a tall cake in an hour.
- First of all, as when preparing any sponge cake, beat eggs with sugar. And the more foam, the better. And then the remaining ingredients are very carefully added to them. Cocoa comes first, then butter, then comes kefir, and then slaked soda and flour.
- The pan must be very hot. It is better to use non-stick cookware. You need to pour about one hundred milliliters of dough into it and smooth it out. This can be done using a silicone spatula. Or you can take a regular tablespoon.
- That's it, then cover the pan with a lid and cook the cake over medium heat.
From the ingredients listed above, you can bake six cakes. One of the main advantages of this biscuit is its softness. That is, it does not need to be further impregnated. All you have to do is coat it with any cream, and the delicious cake is ready.
Step by step recipe
Housewives often use this method of baking sponge cakes when traveling, when there is neither an oven nor a slow cooker at hand. But there is an army of adherents of such preparation, even if they have the necessary equipment, since the cake in the frying pan does not fall off, as can happen in the oven.
For sponge cake in a frying pan, use:
- 4 chicken eggs;
- 200 g granulated sugar;
- 10 g baking powder;
- 100 g butter;
- 210 g wheat flour.
It will take about 55-65 minutes to knead the dough and bake.
The calorie content of this version of the biscuit will be 315.9 kilocalories per hundred gram piece.
How to cook a sponge cake in a frying pan without an oven:
Tall Pie
How to cook a tall sponge cake in a frying pan without an oven? It's also easy. It is important that it can be easily divided into not even two, but three cake layers. There is just a small nuance. The difficulty is that frying pans usually have low walls. So you will have to take a large, cast iron one.
The amount of ingredients is indicated for a cake with a diameter of 18-20 centimeters.
Ingredients:
- Chicken eggs - six pieces.
- Sugar – two hundred grams.
- Vanillin - ten grams.
- Flour - one hundred and sixty grams.
Recipe for “Stovetop sponge cake without oven”:
First of all, prepare the pan. I have an ordinary aluminum pan with a diameter of 17 cm. Cut a circle out of baking paper along the diameter of the pan, grease it with oil and place it on the bottom. Do not grease the sides, otherwise the biscuit will not rise!
We wrap the lid of the pan with a towel so that when baking the biscuit, condensation does not form and does not get on the biscuit.
We turn on the stove at power 1. Since everyone’s stoves are different, I’m showing what power is 1 on mine. There are three of them in total and are divided by another half, so use your stove as a guide. Electric stove. If you have a gas stove, turn it on to the lowest heat and install a divider.
Let's move on to the biscuit. Separate fresh, cold eggs into whites and yolks. Beat the yolks with half the sugar until white.
Beat the egg whites in a clean, cold (preferably iron) bowl until foamy. Gradually add sugar and beat until strong and stable peaks form. If the whites are well beaten, they will not fall if you turn the bowl over. Make sure that not a drop of yolk or water gets into the bowl with the whites. Then the whites will not whip up.
Next, sift the flour into the beaten yolks. At this stage, you can also add vanillin. Or other additives: nuts, poppy seeds, lemon or orange zest, cinnamon or other spices, cocoa (if we add cocoa, then reduce the amount of flour), etc. Thoroughly mix the yolks with flour with a spatula until smooth.
Cooking technology
The entire process takes about an hour. But it may turn out a little more, since it is better to bake the cakes over low heat. After all, it’s better to spend a little more time than to end up with a burnt pie.
- First of all, you need to decide on the dishes. Here, an aluminum pan will serve as a baking dish. Any housewife will understand that it is strictly forbidden to place such utensils with dough on an open fire. So after the dough is ready, you need to put it in a pan, and then put it in a cast iron frying pan.
- The dough itself is quite simple to prepare. First, beat the eggs and sugar well using a mixer. The mass of the liquid should double or even triple. And all the sugar will completely dissolve in it.
- Flour is added carefully, in small parts, preferably one tablespoon at a time. You can stir the dough using a spatula. If you use a mixer for these purposes, be sure to switch it to minimum speed.
- Place parchment paper on the bottom of the pan that will be used for baking. There is no need to lubricate the walls with anything. The container is covered with a lid and wrapped in a waffle towel.
- Then you need to heat the frying pan properly and only then put the pan in it.
- After this, the fire is reduced to a minimum. Now you just have to wait forty-five minutes to an hour. After the appetizing aroma has spread throughout the kitchen after the specified time, you can open the lid and use a wooden skewer to test the cake for doneness. Until this moment, you cannot open the pan - the dough may fall.
All that remains is to remove the biscuit with a knife and cool it.
How to make a baking device?
To prepare a sponge cake in a saucepan according to this recipe, you first need to prepare a device in which the dough will be baked. Place a small plate (which you don’t mind) at the bottom of a roomy pan. Use a smaller pan as a biscuit pan. The bottom of the mold is greased with oil (sunflower, odorless). There is no need to lubricate the walls. A circle with a diameter equal to the bottom is cut out of paper and placed in a mold. In addition, you will also need a lid to cover the pan during baking. It is wrapped in a cotton towel (this is necessary to prevent air from getting inside and condensation from forming). The improvised oven is ready.