Cutting and Folding.—Cut through and through the mixture with a knife or side of a wooden spoon, fold by turning the spoon completely over, thereby blending the materials without breaking the air bubbles. Never stir or beat after cutting and folding.
Mixing Sponge Cake
Beat yolks of eggs until lemon-colored and thick; add sugar and continue beating; add flour; when well blended, cut and fold in the stiffly beaten whites of eggs. Pour into buttered and papered pan; bake in a round pan with a tube in the center.
Baking Cake
For baking both sponge and butter cakes divide the time into quarters. The first quarter, the cake should rise; the second quarter, form a crust and begin to brown; third quarter, continue browning; and fourth quarter, finish browning and shrink from the pan. When baked, this may be determined by pressing crust with the finger; if a depression is left the cake is not done; if the cake springs back and leaves no depression, it is done. Take from oven, invert on a cake cooler, remove paper, turn right-side up and cool. When cold, frost.
Time for baking Cake
Thin cakes and individual cakes require from twelve to fifteen minutes to bake; loaf cakes from thirty to sixty minutes according to size.
If the cake rises unevenly, the mixture is too thick or the oven is too hot.
If the oven seems too hot, when the cake is ready for the oven, put the cake in the oven, but do not close the oven door for the first five or ten minutes of baking.