Hot milk sponge cake recipe

I started my blog in 2008 because I wanted to preserve the recipes that have been handed down to me from my mother and grandmothers. For the past two years I have been working on a cookbook that contains many of these recipes…100 to be exact…and I finally finished it, or at least the first volume, and gave copies to my children and grandchildren for Christmas. They were very happy with it and I loved hearing them as they thumbed through the recipes. I heard lots of “I remember this” and “This is my favorite” and “Grandma used to make this!”

I went over my list of recipes hundreds of times and still managed to leave out some family favorites. One of the reasons I chose the format I did is that I can have additional pages printed that can be added to the ring binder book. My photographs are included with every recipe and I could add comments about whose recipe it is, whose favorite it is, when it was served, etc. I knew if I didn’t write all this stuff down most of it would be lost so I’m breathing a big sigh of relief today that I have preserved this very important part of my family history.

I bet there weren’t many homemakers in the 1950’s and’60’s who didn’t have a recipe for HOT MILK SPONGE CAKE in their file. This is a light as a feather simple cake to make and has a lovely texture and taste. It’s sturdy enough to stand up to frosting and can be cut into shapes for special occasions. My mom made a coconut cake with it by cutting it in half, filling the layers with boiled icing and topping with shredded coconut. It makes delicious light cupcakes too. This cake is no more work than mixing up a cake mix and is so much better. I hope you will try it the way I like it…with fresh fruit and a little whipped cream.

We haven’t really gotten into winter yet and I’m already dreaming about the local berries that will appear in our farmers’ market in a few months…six months to be exact. Those that I purchased last week at the local grocery store…probably from Mexico…were pretty good. With a bite of cake and a little sweetened whipped cream they were more than passable.

Ingredients

• 1 cup sifted all purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
• ½ cup HOT milk
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla

Instructions

1. Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt. Add butter to milk; keep hot. Beat eggs until thick and lemon colored, about 3 minutes at high speed on mixer. Gradually add sugar, beating constantly at a medium speed 4 to 5 minutes.
2. Quickly add sifted dry ingredients to egg mixture; stir just until blended. Stir in hot milk mixture and vanilla; blend well. Pour into a paper-lined 9-inch round or 8-inch square pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes. Cool cake in pan for 15 minutes; remove to rack to finish cooling