Hot-Water Sponge Cake
Tall, fluffy, and simple - it always works! Hot-water sponge cake is one of the most common and easiest cake bases. The layer turns springy, airy, and very tender - an ideal base for any cream or filling.
Updated : 17 February, 2026
Easy
About 30 min.
Ingredients
200 grams
Wheat flour
200 grams
Sugar
3 tablespoon
Vegetable oil
3 tablespoon
Water
5
Eggs
1 teaspoon
Baking powder
0.25 teaspoon
Vanillin
Table
Table of volume measurements:
- teaspoon - 5 ml
- dessert spoon - 10 ml
- tablespoon - 20 ml
- glass - 200 ml
Preparation
Step 1
How to make hot-water sponge cake? Prepare the ingredients. Use large, fresh eggs. If your eggs are small, use 1 extra. The eggs should be at room temperature, so take them out of the fridge in advance. You can replace vanillin with 1 tsp vanilla sugar and add it together with the regular sugar to the eggs (step 1). Use all-purpose flour of the highest grade with protein content no more than 10.3 g.
Step 2
Sift the flour with the baking powder and vanillin into a separate bowl. Sifting is important to aerate the flour - then the cake will be light and rise well in the oven.
Step 3
Crack the room-temperature eggs into a bowl. Start beating with a mixer on low speed, gradually increasing to maximum. Add all the sugar in portions. Beat until the mixture becomes pale and forms a fluffy, stable foam. It should increase 3-4 times in volume. But don’t overbeat: the mixture should be airy with many small bubbles. If you beat too long until it becomes dense, the cake won’t rise during baking.
Step 4
Add the flour mixture to the beaten eggs in 2-3 additions, gently folding with a silicone spatula from top to bottom, trying not to deflate the batter and breaking up any lumps. I prefer mixing with a mixer on the lowest speed. Mix only briefly so you don’t overbeat the eggs. Also, when folding by hand, small flour lumps can remain and are easy to miss.
Step 5
Pour odorless vegetable oil and boiling water into the batter.
Step 6
Mix quickly and thoroughly, reaching the bottom, because the liquid quickly runs to the bottom of the bowl. After mixing, the batter should not lose its fluffiness, but it should become more elastic and keep small bubbles on the surface.
Step 7
Line the bottom of a 20 cm (8 in) baking pan with parchment and grease it with butter. Pour the batter into the pan. Bake in a preheated oven at 170°C (338°F) for about 40 minutes (adjust to your oven). Do not open the door for the first 30 minutes, or the sponge will immediately collapse.
Step 8
Check doneness with a skewer - it should come out dry. Start checking only near the end of baking. If crumbs stick to the skewer, the cake is not baked through inside. If the top is already browned but the batter isn’t ready, cover the pan with a double layer of foil. You can leave the finished sponge in the cooling oven for 10 minutes.
Step 9
To prevent the sponge from sinking, invert it onto a rack and cool to room temperature.
Step 10
The thickness depends on the pan size. In a 20 cm pan, it turns out about 6-7 cm (2.4-2.8 in) tall - standard thickness for a 3-layer cake. As it cools, it may settle just a little, evenly across the surface. That’s normal as long as it doesn’t cave in at the center. When sliced, you’ll see it baked evenly.
Author note
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