Cherry Sponge Cake (Bublanina)

Cherry sponge cake is pretty much the only sweet dessert that I will eat. I just don’t like sweet stuff besides nice braised or barbequed ribs, of course. This is a classical Czech cake and one of few recipes that I follow to the letter. Well, almost. I thought that I could reduce amount of sugar, and I did, but I can only go so far. Since the batter is basically meringue mixed with egg yolks and flour, then of course, no sugar, no meringue. After all, for soft meringue there is a minimum of sugar to egg white ratio of 2 tablespoons of sugar to each egg white so that 3/4 cup of sugar is bare minimum. OK, here it goes:

6 eggs, separated

3/4 cup fine granulated sugar

3/4 cup flour

Lemon zest and juice from 1/2 lemon

1 t. vanilla extract

1-1/2 cups canned pitted sweet cherries

Pinch of salt

Preheat oven to 350 °F. With a pastry brush or paper towel butter bottom and sides of 9” X 12” cake pan or spray with Baking spray (my option).

In a large stainless steel bowl beat egg yolks lightly with fork then mix in lemon zest, lemon juice and vanilla extract. Set aside.

With electric beater or wire whisk beat the egg whites with a pinch of salt until they foam, then beat in the sugar, a tablespoon at a time. Continue beating until the whites form stiff unwavering peaks when beater is lifted from bowl. Do not overbeat.

Note: It is important to have a super clean bowl for whipping egg whites. Smallest trace of fat or grease will ruin your meringue.

Mix about 1/4 of the beaten egg whites into egg yolk mixture then reverse the process and mix with remaining egg whites.

Sprinkle flour on top and with spatula fold until no traces of the flour and whites remain.

Pour the batter into pan and spread cherries evenly on top. Smooth the top and place on middle of the preheated oven for about 40 minutes or until cake is nice golden brown and springy to the touch. Cool in pan before serving.

So moist and good!!!!