Dishwashing sponge cake recipe

Ingredients

Quantity: (if all goes well) six sponges
Needed: two cake tins of 18 cm or 20 cm

• 140 g regular flour
• 120 g granulated sugar
• 3 medium eggs
• 135 g soft butter
• 3 tbsp lemon juice
• lemon zest grated from 2 lemons
• pinch of salt
• ½ teaspoon baking powder
• ¼ teaspoon vanilla extract
• yellow and green food coloring
• 1 tbsp apricot jam

For the foam (for the sponge)

• 1 egg white
• 2 tbsp sugar
• ½ teaspoon lemon juice

Preparation method

1. In a large bowl, whisk together the softened butter, sugar, lemon zest, and vanilla extract.
2. Add the eggs one at a time and mix well after each addition.
3. Sift in the flour, salt and baking powder. Add the lemon juice and mix until smooth. Do not mix too much. Don't worry if the mixture looks like it has curdled. This is due to the citric acid in the lemon juice. It will not affect the texture of the final cake.
4. Pour a third of the batter into a separate bowl (±200 g to 220 g), and set aside.
5. To the larger (two-thirds) portion, add yellow food coloring and stir to get an even color.
6. To the smaller (one third) portion, add the green food coloring and stir to get an even color.
7. Pour each portion of batter into individual cake tins lined with parchment paper. Try to distribute it as evenly as possible.
8. Bake both filled cake tins in a preheated oven at 160°C.
9. The green cake will cook faster than the yellow cake. So remove the smaller, green cake after ±10-12 minutes. Remove the larger, yellow cake after another 5 minutes (a total baking time of ±15-17 minutes).
10. Let both cakes cool completely.

This is how you make the sponges

1. Spread the apricot jam over the yellow cake. The jam acts like glue. Place the green cake firmly on top. We put it all back in the fridge for a while with something heavy on top.
2. To create the shed texture on the green cake, run a sharp serrated knife over the top. See also the video for this.
3. Trim the sides of the cake and cut into six sponge-sized rectangles.

For the foam (the soap)

1. Take a small clean bowl and add the egg whites, lemon juice and sugar. Beat as you would a meringue, but stop beating once soapy bubbles form. Scoop a bit of the soapy water onto your dishwashing sponge and voila, your fake sponge is ready.

TIP
Make the suds just before serving. The texture does not last very long and your sponge will quickly become soggy.

And... are you going to give it a try?!

Author - Mariko Naber
Mariko is the happy brain behind Happlify. Together with partner Mark she runs Sell your stuff online, branding agency Loaded ink BNO and Atelier Naber . She loves feel good, random acts of kindness, meatballs, chocolate mousse, family time, zee, piña colada, sugar & spice and everything nice 💛