Old style Chinese egg cake calls everybody’s childhood memory. This is also referred as mini Chinese sponge cake.
I am always wondering where those yummy little cakes are originated. But I am familiar with them when I was just a little girl. At that time, cakes were quite treasure because we cannot make them at home. However they are always available at larger stores. You can even smell the aroma from miles away.
Growing up, I love to recall the food in my childhood from time to time. At the very beginning, this Chinese egg cake is steamed other than baked. Then at sometime, baked version was on almost every store. Compared with steamed version, I prefer baked version because I can still taste the raw egg taste even after adding lemon zest in the batter.After made this successfully around two weeks ago, I make this little egg cake at least twice every weekend for a quick breakfast.
There are many easy and quite yummy cakes during my childhood. This one is made with egg and flour and we have another one made with yeast and rice flour, check that recipe here-Chinese steamed rice cake(sometimes is also known as sugar cake)
The muffin tin I am using is around 50*15mm for each cupcake.
The most important step of this recipe is to whip the egg until really light(white and no large bubbles anymore). I would suggest using warm water to speed up the process in cold winter days.
I got lots of requests concerning about measuring the ingredients in volume like cups, tablespoons and teaspoons.For traditional Chinese stir fries or soups, I used to skip any measurement process and made adjustment based on personal experience. But I started measure in volume especially for seasonings once I realize that reliable personal experience need years of practice. I use my kitchen scale for almost all of my baking and dessert recipes, as the precise ingredient amounts are so important of a successful baking. So Elaine still highly recommend buying yourself a kitchen scale. Technology changes cooking skill only if you use it.
However, I understand that many of you come across with a desperately needed recipe but there is no kitchen scale on hand. So I update this recipe with volume measurement. I am using US volume measurement. So 1 cup=240ml, 1 tablespoon=15 ml and 1 teaspoon=5ml.
Chinese Egg Cake
Ingredients
- 2 middle size eggs ,room temperature eggs
- 60 g cake flour ,1/2 US cup
- 40 g castor sugar ,around 3 tablespoons+1 teaspoon
- 5 g oil ,olive oil or other vegetable oil around 3/4 teaspoon
- warm water ,for speeding up the whipping process, not required in summer days.
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180 C around 350F.
- Prepare a larger container and add half full warm water, then place your mixing bowl on the warm water. Add eggs and castor sugar. Whip at medium speed until light and fluffy. And then use low speed to remove some large bubbles. This step is the key of success and may take 12- 15 minutes until the mixture reach the ribbon stage.
- Shift flour in. Then use a spatula to combine well. And lastly add oil and well combined too.
- Prepare a mini 12 paper lined muffin tin mold and pour the batter in.
- Bake at the middle rack for 15 to 20 minutes until the surface is well colored.
Notes
Nutrition
Hi Elaine i have follow your receipe closely.For the first time it turn out well n nice even though i accidently put more sugar but the second n third time i made it didn’t turn out well .It was hard.it was a failure . Why n what was the mistake .
Hi Joan,
Though the recipe seems quite simple, but there are lots of details may cause the failure. The stiff cake might be caused by your whipping process or your mixing process. The bubbles inside the egg is killed by long time mixing.
Your article mentions lemon zest, but I don’t see lemon zest in the recipe. I’m trying to recreate something I had years ago while traveling and thought there was a slight lemony taste. Should there be any lemon added?
Hi there,
There is no need to add lemon zest in the baked version.
Hi Elaine,
Thanks for the receipt 🙂
You are so right about the receipe looking simple but there are actually details in it, though.
I think mine is considered as a failure too 🙁
Not sure if I’ve mixed the flour and oil too long or I baked too long?
The cake turns out to be quite stiff and it’s quite hard to peel off the muffin paper.
Is it possible to advice roughly how long does it take to combine well the flour and oil? When I mix the flour, do I have to mix till there are no visible ‘lumps’ then add the oil in?
I will definitely try it again as my mum looks these simple sponge cake 🙂
Hi Yan,
Do not get frustrated! I failed at least 10 times before getting the right texture. Try to choose larger eggs, so there will be more egg white.
According to your description, there might be two reasons. 1. The batter is not fluffy enough (next time, you can lengthen whipping time). 2. you mix the flour too long and kill the treasurable bubbles inside the batter. It is quite important to be quick and gentle when mixing the flour.
Hi Elaine,
Thanks for your encouragement 🙂
I made another attempt today and it turn out better 🙂 But I think maybe this time, it’s a little too fluffy 😛 The batter ended up making 24 mini cakes instead of 12! And it feels really ‘light’ when we ate the cake – like ‘nothing’ 😛
What do you think went wrong this time?
Sorry.. so many questions 🙁
I just made this recipe and it turned out really good!! Everyone else said it was good, but I gave it to my brother to try and he found it really dry. He couldn’t swallow it and had to spit it out. I’ve never had an actual store bought egg cake so I’m no quite sure how it should be tasting. Is it supposed to be dry? Or did I do something wrong? Is there a way I can fix it?
Hi Jenny,
Yes, the cake is relatively dry comparing with other cakes, because it contains just a small amount of oil. Adding more oil can help to make the cake moist.
I would like to know what is castor sugar.
Thank you for send me your recipes.
It means granulated sugar.
How many gram of one medium size egg that you are using?
How many gram of one medium size egg you are using?
Around 50g to 55g each one.
Thank you for your answer. 🙂
Hi Elaine,
Would you try this recipe with a bit of matcha powder?
You can add some matcha powder in the batter. But I never tried before.
Hi Elaine.
I have been looking for a really light fluffy sponge cake as seen in the picture for a while and am going to give this a try. I am from Ireland and would like to know what Cake flour is? Is there a supplement I can use for this?
Thanks,
Yvonne.
Hi Yvonne,
Cake flour is low gluten flour, which can bring a fluffy texture to the finished cake. The protein content should be around 6.5% -9.5% (differ in area). You can firstly check the protein content on the package. If the protein content is too high, then mix your flour with cornstarch at a ratio around 3:1 or 4:1.