Clearing out my parents’ house a few years I forgot about the draw with my mums cooking books and ripped out pages of recipes that were there. As a kid I remember going through all the books to make something delicious like cakes, slices or scones. I was getting to the back of the draw there was an old exercise book with old school hand writing on it. As a kid I remember going through it, but it was too hard to read, it was my Grandmas. I never got to meet her as she died before I was born, so it was nice to hold something she held and written in and recipes she had most likely made.

There are 3 sponge recipes, and this is the first one from 1968.  I think I have made 1 sponge before, so I thought I would give it another go. I decided to make love hearts and mini cream cakes.

This recipe was different because it had bicarb soda added to boiling milk then added to the mixture, which was easy to do as I used the microwave to heat milk. It made the mixture a bit runny but still airy. The sponge came out good and had a nice spongy light texture.

The most important advice I can give is to get the oven ready. Turn it on and move the shelf to the middle or bottom so you can see the sponge when cooking and don’t have to open the door. Also get the baking tin lined so you can pour the batter in and then straight in to the oven. I usually do this at the end because I just want to start baking but then it takes me about 10 mins to find a tin then to line it, but with sponge you don’t want to lose any of the air in the batter so definitely be organised and get that tin ready!

I used small love heart shaped cutters to make little strawberry and coconut cakes, perfect as finger food, and a bigger love heart shape cutter for individual cream cakes

Nutella and Cream Sponge

Strawberry and Coconut Sponge Hearts