I want to experiment with making a savoury sponge cake. The idea is to make something that has the texture of a sponge cake but isn't sweet, and I'll fill it with some creamy savoury sauce that I haven't decided on yet. It's probably a daft idea (blame lockdown fever) and feel free to tell me so if you wish, but what I really want to know is can I take a recipe for a sponge cake and just leave out the sugar?
I want a fairly sturdy sponge. More like the texture of a light fruit cake sponge than a Madeira sponge. If it isn't just a matter of leaving out the sugar then any suggestions of recipes that will achieve what I want will be greatly appreciated.
Best Answer
You may want to look into quick bread recipes instead.
Examples of quick breads include muffins, scones, coffee cakes — often made sweet, but savory versions certainly exist. The primary difference is whether or not there's any sugar, and what sort of additional flavors are mixed in (such as fruits or chocolate in sweet quick breads, cheese or meat or herbs in savory quick breads).
There are quite a lot of "basic quick bread" recipes available, and so I'll let you search on your own rather than post links which may go dead. Just make sure you look for a version that involves oil (and milk/buttermilk) instead of butter; some sweet sponge cake recipes get texture impacts from creaming butter and sugar together, which you couldn't do without sugar.