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I love this sponge cake recipe. It’s easy and you can make hundreds of different cakes with this base. This is a classic European sponge cake (aka Genoise). Once you have this recipe down (you’ll memorize it after a couple rounds), you’ll be baking things that look and taste like they are from a fancy bakery.
This cake base takes on moisture really well from fruit, frostings, liqueurs and syrups. As you can tell from my cake recipes, I’m a sucker for moist cakes. Read on to see 11 marvelous recipes you can make using this sponge cake base.
Over the years, I’ve tested countless different ways to make this cake and this is the best, most fail-proof method for genoise that I’ve tested. This is not like American cakes and readers often question if it can really be that easy and only have 4 ingredients.
I want you to discover this gem of a cake and succeed EVERY TIME you make it. I hope you find this video helpful. We had you in mind! 🙂
Watch How To Make Sponge Cake:
Tips for Success (Read First!):
1. When no streaks of flour remain in the dough, fold a few extra times to ensure you aren’t missing pockets of flour at the bottom
2. Bake the cake layers right after folding in the flour – they should not sit too long
3. Always use a conventional oven setting (not a convection/fan setting)
4. An electric hand mixer will take 2-4 minutes longer to beat the eggs
5. Tip from reader, Hilda: “How do you know u get the right consistency? Lift up your beater (whisk) from the batter. Make a figure “8” using the batter that drip off the beater. Then count to 10 seconds. If the figure 8 still remains on top of the batter, then u have the right consistency. If the figure 8 sinks into the batter before 10 secs, then u need to beat it longer.”
6. Bake in the center of the oven
7. Place cake in a fully pre-heated oven
8. Do not open the oven door to check on the cake until towards the end
9. Let the cake cool in a room without any outdoor draft which can make it seem eggy
Sponge Cake Recipes you can master at home:
Blackberry Lemon Cake – soft and moist and has a fluffy lemon blackberry buttercream frosting.
Charlotte Cake – layers of raspberry mousse, lady fingers and fluffy cake.
Poppy Seed Cake – fluffy and moist with a hint of rum and it’s not overly sweet.
Strawberry Sponge Cake – boasts 1 1/2 lbs of fresh strawberries. You’ll love the simple and delicious whipped cream cheese frosting.
Black Forest Cake – A chocolate version of classic genoise with 1 lb of kirsch infused cherries and whipped cream. So good!!
Russian Apple Cake (Sharlotka) – Just 5 ingredients and 15 min of prep, then your oven does the rest!
Poppy Seed Cake Roll – Moist, generously filled with a cream cheese frosting, covered with velvety chocolate ganache and pummeled with salted pistachios.
Pomegranate Christmas Cake – With a crown of glistening pom seeds, this one’s a stunner for the holidays.
Story Book Cake Roll – This cake roll is moist, rolled with a vanilla butter cream, covered in decadent chocolate and the cookie crumbs give it a subtle crunch.
Kiwi Berry Cake – If you love fruit, this cake will make your dreams come true. Layer after layer of gorgeous berries.
Tiramisu – if you like tiramisu, you will love this!
I told you I loved this cake base. I’m Completely smitten 🙂
4-Ingredient Sponge Cake (Video Recipe)
Ingredients
- 6 large eggs, room temperature
- 1 cup granulated sugar, 210 grams
- 1 cup all-purpose flour, 130 grams
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
Instructions
Prep:
- Preheat Oven to 350˚F. Line bottoms of two 9″ cake pans with parchment paper (do not grease the sides).
How to Make this Sponge Cake:
- In the bowl of an electric stand mixer fitted with whisk attachment (this is the one I have), beat 6 large eggs for 1 minute on high speed. With the mixer on, gradually add 1 cup sugar and continue beating 8-10 minutes until thick and fluffy.
- Whisk together 1 cup flour and 1/2 tsp baking powder then sift this mixture into fluffy egg mixture one third at a time. Fold with a spatula with each addition just until incorporated. Scrape spatula from the bottom to catch any pockets of flour and stop mixing when no streaks of flour remain. Do not over-mix or you will deflate the batter.
- Divide evenly between prepared cake pans (it helps if you have a kitchen scale to weight the pans). Bake at 350˚F for 23-28 minutes (my oven took 25 min), or until top is golden brown. Remove from pan by sliding a thin spatula (here’s the one I love for cakes) around the edges then transfer to a wire rack and remove parchment backing. Cool cakes to room temperature then slice layers equally in half with a serrated knife.
If you make this recipe, I’d love to see pics of your creations on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter! Hashtag them #natashaskitchen
Hi Natasha, Great video and recipe. I know you have over 800 reviews and queasiness I apologize if this is a duplicate question.
Why AP flour vs cake flour?
Thanks again
Doug
Hi Doug, that is a great question! I have used cake flour and the cake becomes very soft and airy. It depends what kind of cake you are trying to achieve but the cake flour makes the cake too soft and light for most frostings.
After baking how long with this sponge keep? Can I cover this in fondant and buttercream and put another cake on top for an occasion cake or will the sponge be too light? Thank you!
HI Lorraine, Yes, you can make the cake base ahead of time and store it either in the fridge or at room temperature for a day or wrap and freeze up to 3 months. It may be a little soft for fondant unless you put a stiffer buttercream over it first – that may work.
I use this cake for tiramisu. So much better than ladyfingers!
I’m so happy you enjoyed that, Lauralee!
Hi Natasha,thank you so much for the recipe,i will definately try it,if i want to add butter among the list of ingredients will i reduce the eggs or flour ? or will i use the same ingredients? kind help, i want to use this recipe and add some butter.
Hi Faith! I haven’t experiment with this recipe specifically so I cannot advise. This ratio of eggs to sugar is pretty standard for this classic European sponge cake and for a 2-layer cake is a fair amount of sugar. Most of our cakes are not overly sweet but I guess it depends on taste preference. Milk, oil and butter are not necessary in sponge cake and can actually deflate the batter.
What more is there to say than: stunning!
I’m so happy you enjoyed that!
How funny. I made a choc sponge this morning. I added the coco to the eggs
Thank you for sharing that with me!
I’d like to make a chocolate sponge cake using this recipe. Can I just add cocoa to the flour and then fold it into the batter?
Hi Rachel, I have made a chocolate sponge cake before but don’t have a recipe posted yet. I’ll add it to my list
I would love to make this recipe as a chocolate sponge, I am just not sure how much cocoa to add, any suggestions?
For a chocolate sponge cake, you basically substitute some of the flour with cocoa. So you could try 1/4 cup sifted cocoa and 3/4 cup flour and sift them together before folding them into the batter.
❤️ great recipe. I made a classic strawberry and whipped cream cake and it was fabulous, I will definitely try some other variations. Thanks for sharing this awesome recipe and excellent instructions.
I’m so happy you enjoyed that. Thank you for sharing that with us!
Hi Natasha — I haven’t made this yet, but wondering if I could make the entire recipe in a bundt pan?
Thanks!
Hi Shari! I honestly have never tried it in a Bundt pan and I don’t think I would try because it would be really difficult to get it out of the pan.
Thanks so much for the quick reply. I’ll make it in 2 rounds!! Happy baking!
Thanks for the quick reply. I’ll do it 2 rounds. 🙂
Hi, Natasha. Thqnk you for your great receipe! I am living in Netherlands and we are accounting with cm instead if inch🙈 I have 20 cm pan which is 7.87 inch. May I follow the same amount ingredient and the baking time?
Hi Helen, I have not tested this in a seven-inch round baking pan to say for sure, so I’m not certain if it would overflow the pan. That would be my main concern. You may need to scale the recipe back. Let me know if you experiment.
Yes you do however the finished product out of the oven video shows a one pan cooked cake and that confuses people. That particular video leads people to believe that the cake when divided into two pans will rise to the top of the pan which leads lost Navas bakers to think that our cake did not come out correctly I’m not sure if you you understand exactly what I’m saying and when it doesn’t rise to the top we think we did it wrong that’s all I’m saying nothing bad about your recipe or your cake because it’s yummy.
Hi Jeffrey, I’m still not sure what you mean. I did divide the cake into 2 pans in the instructions as well as in the video and then I took them out of the oven in 2 pans the same way I put them in. If the cake doesn’t rise as high, the number one culprit is usually under-beating the eggs and sugar – since the cake relies primarily on the volume of those ingredients for leavening. I hope that helps!
Is this cake very sweet? Seems to have a higher proportion of sugar vs flour.
Hi Karen, I haven’t tried this cake with less sugar since this cake does rely on the volume of eggs and sugar to rise but we think it is not too sweet several of our readers have commented it is a perfect balance.
I thank what the problem is with the video she cuts and paste‘s different parts. And one cake video she has your put the cake into pants and when she takes it out the cake is level with the top making you think that it rises. However In the sponge video where she says put it equally into 9 inch pans after it’s cooked she shows you a cooked version from a different video where the batter is all in one pan when it shows it even with the top. I made this recipe 17 times thinking I was doing it wrong when I actually the visual video is what was throwing me off I hope this helps
Hi Jeffrey, I do have a couple of recipes where I put it into 1 pan and then cut it, but that does have a differing bake time. Normally, I do divide it into 2 pans as this video shows.
Hi do you have the ingredients for one cake only? Not sure if it’s as simple as just splitting everything in half?
Hi Sue! yes you would halve everything proportionally
Hi Natasha! This recipe was the most amazing cake I have ever baked!! My family was impressed with the spongy texture. Do you think it would taste the same if I added fruit to the batter?
I’m so happy to hear that Alayna! Thank you for sharing your awesome review with us!
Hi, I’m interested in trying this recipe out but I do not have an electric mixer. Would a blender or hand whisking work?
Hello Jessye, I honestly haven’t tried using a high powered blender for this so I can’t say for sure. I suspect it wouldn’t whip the batter properly as a whisk attachment would. This cake relies on the volume of the eggs and sugar to rise so I probably wouldn’t risk it.
The sponge was amazing !!!
So moist and tender. I halved a recipe because I only needed “crust” for a no bake cheesecake.
Will try in a cake next time.
Hi Aneta, I’m so happy you enjoyed this recipe! Thank you for sharing that with me!
Hi! Did you adjust cooking time after halving it? Thanks!
No I didn’t. It took about 20 min in 10 in springform pan
Can this be used for layered cake? Like 4 layers
Hi Eshy! I haven’t tested that with 4 layers but I think that could work!
Hi Natasha. Thanks for another great recipe! Tried this and it turned out great!
Could I make these ahead and freeze for later use?
I’m so happy you enjoyed that, Julia!! Yes, you can make the cake base ahead of time and store it either in the fridge or at room temperature for a day or wrap and freeze up to 3 months.
I loved the sponge cake so easy to make !! But it makes one sponge cake only
Hi Sumaya, this recipe makes 2 9″ rounds.
I will try these cakes. They ate so easy to make with not too much ingredients. First one I will try is the apple. Will let you know it turned out.
Cece
I look forward to your feedback, Cece!