Tips from the Experts: Roger

5-time Senior Homecraft Sponge Sandwich Winner

A retired dairy farmer may seem an unlikely sponge master, but who can argue with five wins at the Bendigo Show? He's won a glass cake display stand each time, and each of the girls in his family have been given one. His youngest granddaughter is yet to get hers, so in the unlikely case that one of us beat him, we'll be giving our display plate to her.

Roger is a gentle man with a dry sense of humour; he was kind enough to cook a sponge while we took notes, but assured us that he would leave out something vital or add something in. It seems a bit cruel, but you can hardly blame him, given that we will be his (underqualified) rivals. We are left floundering about what's solid advice and what he's put in as a decoy.

Side note: Roger's wife, Glenys, is a steward at the show. With a resume this solid I don't know why they haven't gone into sponge consultancy. Glenys is an accomplished cook in her own right (toffee apples for the church fair!), but leaves the showing of sponges to Roger.

Roger's tips include:

• Separating the eggs is bullshit. (His words, not mine.)
• Warm the eggs by bathing them in hot water for a few minutes before cracking them.
• Beat the eggs on a medium speed for 18 minutes with a stand mixer.
• Use wheaten cornflour, and the brand of the ingredients is of no consequence.
• Custard powder in the recipe results in immediate dismissal by the judges.
• Measure out the cornflour then add an extra tablespoon full 'for the pot'. (What is this, a pot of tea? Oh well - who am I to argue?)
• Use a whisk to incorporate the dry ingredients. A whisk! 
• Grease tins with Copha after heating them up a little on the stove. Line the bottoms with baking paper.
• Weigh the mixture when it goes into the tins to ensure exact halves are achieved.
• Find the ideal height for the trays in your oven. Roger has them two spaces from the bottom of the oven but this will differ depending on your oven.
• Roger actively endorses tin-banging prior to putting sponges in the oven too. 
• When arranging the two sponge halves for showing, place the bottom half upside down on the plate and the top half right-way up. 

It so happens that Roger is a pretty philosophical character, and I'm glad we could spend time with him for this to surface. The take home message was that 'it doesn't pay to follow all the rules. You've got to make your own mind up.' This seems like good advice for making sponges in particular and for life in general.

The verdict: Wow. Never before have I come across a sponge with a texture this fine. It's something else entirely.

I can't wait to have a few more attempts before The Big One. I don't want to peak too early, but we have pure gold advice right here and we really want to do the competition justice. There's nothing worse than going in under-done, so to speak.

A massive thanks to Marion and Roger for welcoming us into their homes to share their tips. The cooking, the cuppas, and the chats were priceless, and it feels like the sponges are almost beside the point. We are left feeling a little bit smarter with our sponges (how can we gain in an hour and a half the wisdom these two have collected over decades?) and a big bit fuller in our hearts.

Tips from the Experts: Marion.

Adored Mum and Grandmother: Celebrated home cook. 

With a mixing spoon as worn as this, the lady must be taken seriously. Her fierce left hand can cream butter and sugar better than any machine.

Watching her bake is a joy. She's efficient, she's tidy and she doesn't bother measuring things exactly. She's so bloody clever that she doesn't need to. Mark us down as impressed.

The recipe is from a friend from a couple of decades ago and it's been making spot-on sponges regularly the whole time. It's written in her recipe notebook - so full and falling apart that only she would dare find the page it's on for fear of destroying the whole delicate, priceless artefact. The recipe doesn't mess about with melted butter or boiling water, the only flour it uses is cornflour and it requires that the cook separate the eggs.

Marion's tips for near-perfect sponges include:

• Use the biggest eggs you can buy. Grandma Carter used duck eggs, but any giant ones will do. If you're using eggs from your own chooks, give them a stern talking to about increasing their egg size.
• Make sure your eggs are room temperature, and separate them with the greatest of care. Broken yolks = unfathomable disaster.
• Beat eggs with handheld electric beaters. Standing there patiently is all a part of the ritual. Side note: the beaters are older than me, and have aged far more gracefully.
• Use a bowl with graduated sides. It's easier to fold in the flour.
• Scrape the edges and bottom of the bowl when folding in flour, and fold with a gentle and deliberate action, slowly spinning the bowl as you go.
• Weigh the two tins after dividing the mixture evenly to ensure perfectly equal halves. 
• Bang the tins a few times on the bench before putting them in the oven to remove the big bubbles.

Marion put the sponges in the oven for 15 minutes and we set about having a cup of tea. Like some sort of renegade, she opened the oven door when the timer went off, to see if they needed an extra 2 mins. After a quick and gentle prod with her forefinger it was decided they were ready. She expertly removed them from the tins onto a clean and pretty tea towel laid over the cooling rack. We promptly ate one half with our cuppa.

The verdict: feather-light and delicious with a fine, consistent texture.