[Sca-cooks] OOP: Victoria Sponge

[Philip & Susan Troy]

Lisbeth Herr-Gelatt wrote:
>
> Meanwhile, I've got another recipe for Victoria Sponge/Sandwich Cake (which is the variety your mother probably came
> across).

It looks pretty close to the one posted last night, and to the one I
found on the Web, all of which I assume to be fairly modern versions.

> I suppose the Name of the recipe threw our doughty Adamantius off the scent. Heh heh. This recipe is as "Victorian" as all those French-named dishes in England are actually "French"...... though to be honest with you an old friend of the family's great-aunt (or somesuch) was actully a cook for Her Royal Majesty at a visit to a country manor, and sponge cakes aren't right out, are just the right sort of thing.

I'm confused. I think we've pretty well established already that
Victoria sponge (or a recognizable and suitably-named variant) existed
at least as of 1861, which would mean Victoria was not even at the
midpoint of her reign when the recipe was published in the earliest
source we could find. So, I guess it depends on what one means by Victorian.

 > These are all creamed-batter caked (butter and sugar creamed
together, which was a new-ish skill for English housewives in 1950,
hence the confusion about sponge versus regular modern cakes).
Previously they would have rubbed the butter into the flour with their
hands for a heavier regular cake, or gone the real sponge route with the
whipped egg whites etc...
>

I suspect that calling it a sponge may be a throwback to the time when
one distinguished a lighter cake from a heavier fruitcake-type entity by
calling it a sponge, which, presumably, it was, then.

> I think I should note that if it WAS a sponge, it could be a Hot-milk sponge (the ultra-special spongecake in England at the time of Victoria).  However, that recipe seems to elude me at the moment.