I rarely cook with recipes. I prefer to create my own as I go. I also like to bake without recipes. This surprises people as baking has the reputation that all measurements must be precise, and you mess with a recipe at your own peril. But, once you understand a few guidelines, you can make your own recipes with ease.

Today, I will explain the guidelines as they apply to pound and sponge cakes.

The point of baking is to capture air. Air is what makes cakes, pancakes, biscuits, etc. light and fluffy. You introduce air into your baked goods through mixing methods and by adding chemical leaveners like baking powder and baking soda. To keep the air you introduced to the batter, and get light, fluffy baked goods, you need structural elements like the protein in egg whites and gluten in flour[i]. Sugar and fat tenderize the cake by preventing the formation of gluten. Sugar and fat fight against the structure provided by the protein in eggs and flour. Because of this, a successful cake needs sugar, fat, flour and eggs to be in balance.

Baker’s ratios provide formulas that create the balance[ii].

Pound Cakes (Lean Ratio) Sponge Cakes (High Ratio)
Weight of sugar <= weight of flour Weight of sugar >= weight of flour
Weight of eggs >= weight of fat Weight of eggs > weight of fat
Weight of liquid (including eggs) = weight of sugar Weight of liquid (including eggs) >= weight of sugar

 

The difference in the ratio of sugar to flour and the mixing method determines whether you are making a pound cake or a sponge cake. The pound cake has less sugar than flour and the sponge cake has more sugar than flour. To make a pound cake, you cream the butter and sugar (adding tiny bubbles of air), add the flavorings (vanilla, spices, citrus) then mix in the eggs and flour. To make a sponge cake, you mix the eggs and sugar until they are foamy and at least doubled in volume (adding slightly larger bubbles of air), add the flavorings, then add the butter and flour[iii]. If you want to capture even more air, you could separate the eggs, separately beat the egg whites until they just reach the stiff peak stage, then gently fold them into the batter. When you bake the cake, the trapped air expands causing the cake to rise, making it fluffy.

Most cakes also use baking powder or baking soda to help them rise. The chemical reaction introduces air into the batter. The heat from the oven causes the bubbles to expand. The guideline here is to use baking powder unless you are using acidic ingredients like buttermilk or citrus. Use ¼ tsp baking soda per cup of flour or 1 tsp of baking powder per cup of flour (baking powder contains baking soda along with the acid needed to activate it). If you read a lot of recipes like I do, you will notice that cakes that call for buttermilk often use baking powder and baking soda, while cakes without acidic ingredients use only baking powder. Regular cocoa powder is not acidic. Dutch process cocoa powder is; so if you substitute regular cocoa powder for Dutch process cocoa powder, reduce or get rid of the baking soda.

The ratios are based on the weight of the ingredients and here’s where it gets a little complicated. Butter isn’t just fat, it is also water, so if you want to calculate if the eggs weigh more than the fat, you have to account for the weight of the water in the butter. You can generally assume that butter is 80% fat, but if you use Irish or European butter you should check the package as they have a higher fat content than regular, American butter. Cream also needs to be adjusted to correctly account for the fat.

These are just guidelines and successful cakes can vary from this. Shirley Corriher in her book Bakewise says you should stay within 25%.  That’s why it is generally better to make two recipes rather than just doubling a recipe.  Doubling could make a recipe exceed the guidelines or be more out of balance.

Now that I’ve explained how to balance ingredients for a successful cake, the next step is to figure out how to size the cakes. I want to make 6 inch diameter cakes because they are easier to give away than the typical 8 or 9 inch diameter cake. Luckily, Wilton has a nice chart that lists how much batter and frosting you need for variously sized and shaped cake pans. In general, you need about 4 to 6 cups of batter for two 6 inch layers. You can estimate how much batter you have by just looking at the recipe and adding up the volume.

Here is one of my experiments. Below the ingredients I’ll compare the ratios in my cake to the high ratio guidelines.

sliced of tangerine fruits

Orange Rosemary Cake

Ingredients

  • 1 ¼ cup all-purpose flour
  • ½ teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 cup granulated sugar
  • ¾ cup orange juice
  • ¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 egg (I use extra large) plus 1 egg yolk
  • ¼ teaspoon vanilla extract
  • ¼ teaspoon finely chopped fresh rosemary
  • Zest of one orange – about 1 Tablespoon

green plant on white background

Instructions

  • Preheat oven to 350 F.
  • Gently warm the olive oil and finely chopped rosemary in a pan or in the microwave; set aside.
  • Generously butter and flour (2) 6-inch round cake pans; set aside.
  • In a bowl whisk together the flour, salt, baking powder, and orange zest; set aside.
  • In a bowl, beat together the sugar and egg until foamy and at least doubled in volume.
  • Mix in the rosemary oil and vanilla.
  • Add the dry ingredients to the sugar/egg/liquid mixture, alternating with the orange juice, beating well after each addition.
  • Pour the batter into the cake pans; evenly dividing it.
  • Bake on the middle rack for 25-30 minutes until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
  • Let cool in the pans until warm (about 10 minutes) and then remove from the pans and allow to cool completely on a cooling rack.
  • Frost the cooled cakes with cream cheese frosting.

A note about the recipe.  My cake is an oil cake instead of a butter cake because I think oil cakes are more moist and tender. I chose to use olive oil because I think the flavor will go well with the orange and rosemary.  Normally, I would use a neutral oil like canola.

The weights (approximate) of the ingredients are as follows:

  • 1 ¼ cup =  3 ounces
  • ¼ cup of olive oil = 9 ounces
  • 1 extra large egg plus 1 yolk = 3 ounces
  • 1 cup of sugar = 7 ounces
  • ¾ cup of orange juice = 5 ounces

The total volume of my ingredients is roughly 4 cups (1 extra large egg plus an egg yolk is approximately ⅓ cup). Remember that the eggs increase in volume when beaten.

My cake satisfies the high ratio guidelines since:

  • Weight of sugar >= weight of flour ü
  • Weight of eggs > weight of fat ü
  • Weight of liquid (including eggs) >= weight of sugar ü

 

I made a cream cheese frosting and added orange zest. I hope you all have fun making your own cake recipes and I hope you post them in the forum.

You may have noticed that these guidelines do not apply to whole categories of cakes like angel food, chiffon, genoise, etc.  Angel food cakes after all, don’t have any fat – not even egg yolks. I’ll discuss those types of cakes in another post.

[i] Jeff Potter, Cooking for Geeks – Air as an Ingredient chapter.

[ii] Shirley Corriher, Bakewise – pages 31-35.

[iii] Michael Ruhlman, Ratios – Batters chapter.