387454 Mon Apr 02 07:44:19 -0700 2007 3 31 Home Cooking 0 2442336 Yesterday I made a sponge cake for Passover - followed the instructions yet my sponge cake didn't rise that much. The recipe said to beat the egg whites till soft peaks formed - should I have beat them until they were stiff? Mon Apr 02 07:44:19 -0700 2007 11586 jasmine 1 2442588 Your recipe was right -- you get the best volume from soft peaks. The two most likely culprits are overmixing the flour when you add it and old eggs. Since the leavening in sponge cakes relies entirely on the air beaten into the eggs, folding technique is critical to mix the flour in without deflating the eggs. Any good baking book will have instructions for folding, so you might want to take a look at those and follow them to the letter. As for the age of the eggs making a difference, I'm reminded of an anecdote Julia Child told of Jacques Pepin's sponge cakes. Try as she might, she could never get hers as light as his until she decided to observe him making one. The eureka moment came when she saw him go outside to get the eggs -- straight from the chickens. As eggs age, the proteins in the whites start to lose their ability to hold in the air. If you can get really fresh eggs from a farmer's market, and you mix the flour in as efficiently and as minimally as possible, soft peaks should give you a lovely sponge cake. Mon Apr 02 09:00:52 -0700 2007 2442336 39565 JepJonson 1 2444937 Did the recipe say to grease or flour your pan? I don't know about sponge cake, but I heard a rumour that greasing the pan when you make angel food cake is a no-no, because it prevents the cake from rising. Mon Apr 02 21:06:03 -0700 2007 2442336 34604 sweetie 1 2445048 It could be a number of individual things or a combo of things. Did you beat your egg yolks long enough -- to a ribbon stage, or when the foam climbs up the side of the mixer bowl and then stops? Sounds like you did OK with the egg whites, though under-beaten and also over-beaten egg whites can cause lack of rising. Flour: it's important that the flour be folded in very gently, so as not to disturb the foam and break all those little bubbles that are providing the cake height. Last, was your oven temp all preheated and at the right temp? That's important also in maintaining the "structure" of the cake. For additional info (and there is plenty), simply Google sponge cake problems or genoise problems, and you'll see many possible solutions. I've read the same thing (about not greasing the pan, tho using parchment) as Sweetie, above. Mon Apr 02 22:18:52 -0700 2007 2442336 18222 maria lorraine