Eggs in Cakes and Biscuits
Cooking Skills: Eggs 2
Chapter 5 · Eggs in Cakes and Biscuits
Skill goal
Understand what the egg is doing in a bake, and make a sponge, a muffin, a biscuit and a glazed scone.
Shopping list for this chapter
The basics
In baking an egg does four jobs at once, and knowing which job it is doing tells you what to change when a bake goes wrong.
- Structure: the proteins set as they heat and hold the cake up. More egg means a firmer, springier crumb.
- Lift: beaten eggs hold tiny air bubbles, and heat makes them swell. A whisked sponge has no raising agent at all: the eggs do the lifting.
- Richness: yolk adds fat and a tender, moist crumb. That is why shortbread with a yolk is softer than shortbread without.
- Colour and shine: a brush of beaten egg gives a golden, glossy finish (egg wash).
- Room-temperature eggs mix more smoothly into butter and whip to a greater volume. Take them out of the fridge 30 minutes before, or stand them in warm tap water for 5 minutes.
- Crack eggs into a cup first, so a bad one or a bit of shell doesn't end up in the mixture.
- Oven: all the temperatures here are for a fan oven (add 20°C for conventional). Every oven differs, so use the times as a guide and check with a skewer: it should come out clean.
- Don't open the oven door in the first two thirds of the time, or a sponge can sink.
Try it
Level 1 · Start here
All-in-one sponge
Everything goes in one bowl, which makes it a forgiving first cake. Eat it plain, or split and fill with jam and a spoonful of yoghurt for a lighter filling.
Ingredients (8 portions)
- 100 g self-raising flour
- 100 g soft butter or baking spread
- 100 g caster sugar
- 2 medium eggs, at room temperature
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tbsp milk
- ½ tsp vanilla extract
- A little butter, for greasing
- Heat the oven to 160°C fan (180°C conventional, gas 4). Grease and line an 18 cm round tin, or put 8 paper cases in a muffin tin.
- Put everything in a large bowl and beat with a wooden spoon or an electric whisk for about 2 minutes, until pale and smooth.
- Spoon into the tin or cases and level the top.
- Bake for 25 minutes (cupcakes: 15 to 18 minutes), until golden and springy and a skewer comes out clean.
- Cool in the tin for 5 minutes, then on a wire rack.
Don't lick the bowl
Cake mixture contains raw egg and raw flour. Cooked, both are fine, but taste only the finished cake.
Level 1 · Breakfast bake
Blueberry muffins
A muffin is a one-bowl cake. The skill is the opposite of the sponge: mix as little as you can.
Ingredients (6 portions)
- 200 g plain flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 60 g caster sugar
- 1 medium egg
- 200 ml semi-skimmed milk
- 50 ml sunflower or vegetable oil
- 100 g blueberries, fresh or frozen
- Pinch of salt
- Heat the oven to 180°C fan (200°C conventional, gas 6). Put 6 paper cases in a muffin tin.
- Mix the flour, baking powder, sugar and salt in a large bowl.
- In a jug, beat the egg with the milk and oil. Pour it onto the dry ingredients and stir for no more than 10 seconds, until just combined. It should look lumpy.
- Fold in the blueberries gently, then divide between the cases.
- Bake for 20 to 22 minutes, until risen and golden. Cool on a wire rack.
Lumps are good
Overmixing a muffin makes the gluten in the flour stretch, giving tunnels and a tough, chewy texture. A lumpy batter makes a tender muffin.
Level 2 · Biscuits
Egg-yolk shortbread
Three ingredients and a yolk. The yolk makes the dough easier to handle and the biscuit tender and a little richer.
Ingredients (12 portions)
- 150 g plain flour
- 100 g cold butter, cubed
- 50 g caster sugar, plus extra for sprinkling
- 1 medium egg yolk
- Pinch of salt
- Heat the oven to 160°C fan (180°C conventional, gas 4). Line a baking tray.
- Rub the butter into the flour, sugar and salt with your fingertips until it looks like fine breadcrumbs. Add the yolk and bring it together into a dough, without kneading.
- Press the dough into a rectangle about 1 cm thick on the tray. Prick with a fork and score into 12 fingers. Chill for 15 minutes.
- Bake for 18 to 20 minutes, until pale gold. Sprinkle with caster sugar, re-cut along the lines while hot, and cool on the tray.
Level 2 · Egg wash
Cheese scones with an egg glaze
A scone dough is light and quick, and the glaze is what turns it from pale to bakery-golden.
Ingredients (6 portions)
- 225 g self-raising flour, plus extra for dusting
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 50 g cold butter, cubed
- 75 g mature Cheddar, grated
- 2 medium eggs (one for the dough, one for the glaze)
- 80 ml milk, plus a splash for the glaze
- Pinch of salt
- Heat the oven to 200°C fan (220°C conventional, gas 7). Line a baking tray.
- Rub the butter into the flour, baking powder and salt. Stir in two thirds of the cheese.
- Beat one egg with the milk and add it, mixing with a knife into a soft dough.
- Pat out to 2.5 cm thick on a floured surface and cut into 6 rounds with a 6 cm cutter. Don't twist the cutter or the scones will rise lopsided.
- Beat the second egg with a splash of milk, and brush it only over the tops (egg dripping down the sides glues the scone to the tray). Sprinkle with the rest of the cheese.
- Bake for 12 to 15 minutes, until risen and deep gold.
Level 3 · Technique
Whisked (fatless) sponge
There is no butter and no baking powder: the eggs do everything. It is a lovely light sponge for layering with fruit and yoghurt, and the best lesson in what whisked egg can do.
Ingredients (8 portions)
- 3 medium eggs, at room temperature
- 75 g caster sugar
- 75 g plain flour, sifted
- A little butter and flour, for the tin
- Heat the oven to 170°C fan (190°C conventional, gas 5). Grease and line a 20 cm round tin.
- Put the eggs and sugar in a large bowl and whisk with an electric whisk for 5 to 8 minutes, until thick, pale and tripled in volume. When you lift the whisk, the trail it leaves should sit on the surface for 3 seconds. This is called the ribbon stage.
- Sift the flour over the top in two goes and fold it in gently with a large metal spoon, cutting down through the middle and turning the mixture over. Stop as soon as there are no streaks of flour.
- Pour into the tin and bake for 18 to 20 minutes, until golden and springy and the sponge shrinks slightly from the sides.
- Cool in the tin for 5 minutes, then on a rack. Split, and fill with fruit and thick yoghurt.
Be gentle
Everything in this cake depends on the air in the eggs. Folding firmly pops the bubbles and gives a flat, rubbery cake.
Experiments
Experiment
Cold vs room-temperature eggs
How much difference does the temperature make?
- Make the all-in-one sponge twice as cupcakes. Use eggs straight from the fridge in one batch and room-temperature eggs in the other.
- Bake side by side, then cool and cut one of each in half.
Look for: The height, how smooth the mixture looked before baking, and the crumb. Often there is a small difference rather than a dramatic one.
Experiment
Whole egg or yolk only
See what white and yolk each give a biscuit.
- Make three small batches of the shortbread dough: with a yolk, with half a beaten whole egg, and with no egg (add 1 tbsp cold water instead).
- Bake them together and compare once cool.
Look for: The yolk gives a tender, rich biscuit. A whole egg gives a crisper, slightly cakey one. No egg is the crumbliest, and hardest to handle.
Experiment
Egg wash options
Which glaze do you prefer?
- Make the scone dough and cut 4 scones. Brush one with whole beaten egg, one with yolk and a splash of milk, one with milk only, and leave one bare.
- Bake them together on one tray.
Look for: Yolk gives the deepest gold and a high shine, whole egg a good all-rounder, milk a soft matt brown, and the bare scone stays pale.
Tasting notes
| Item | Method | What I saw | What I thought | Will I do it again? |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| All-in-one sponge | ||||
| Blueberry muffins | ||||
| Egg-yolk shortbread | ||||
| Cheese scones | ||||
| Whisked sponge | ||||
| Cold vs room-temp eggs | ||||
| Shortbread: yolk / whole / none | ||||
| Egg wash options |
Troubleshooting
| Problem | Likely cause | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Cake sank in the middle | Oven door opened early, or oven too cool | Keep the door shut until the last third; check the oven temperature |
| Cake is dry | Overbaked, or too little fat or egg | Check 5 minutes early; a skewer should come out clean, not bone-dry |
| Mixture curdled when adding eggs | Eggs too cold | Use room-temperature eggs and add a spoonful of flour with each egg |
| Muffins tough with tunnels | Overmixed | Stir for 10 seconds, leaving lumps |
| Whisked sponge is flat and rubbery | Not whisked enough, or folded too hard | Whisk to ribbon stage and fold gently with a metal spoon |
| Shortbread spread and went greasy | Butter too warm | Chill the dough on the tray before baking |
| Scones lopsided | Twisted the cutter, or glaze dripped down the sides | Press straight down and glaze only the tops |
Food safety: baking with eggs
Raw cake and biscuit mixtures contain raw egg, so don't taste them. Bake until cooked through. Use Lion-marked eggs, keep eggs in the fridge until 30 minutes before baking, and wash your hands, the bowl and the whisk after handling raw egg. Anything filled with fresh cream or yoghurt goes in the fridge and is eaten within 2 days.
Checkpoint: can you do this now?
- I know the four jobs an egg does in baking.
- I can make a simple sponge in one bowl.
- I can whisk eggs and sugar to the ribbon stage and fold without knocking the air out.
- I can mix a muffin batter lightly and recognise a lump that is fine.
- I know which glaze gives which finish.
Next chapter
Cooking Skills: Eggs 2, chapter 6 is Meringue: whipping egg whites to the right stage, for kisses, nests and pavlova. Save the spare whites from the baking this week.