This old fashioned Chinese egg cake has a dense crumb and comforting flavor that have a sweet nostalgia for many, including me. They are mini cakes—bake the whole recipe in one standard 12-cup muffin pan! I love to eat these cakes on their own with my second cup of coffee for the day or a cup of herbal tea.Kaitlin also had the idea of serving them with sliced peaches or berries and a dollop of whipped cream! Chinese Egg Cake: Background  This Chinese Old Fashioned Cake has a long history that can be traced back to the Qing Dynasty.It is one of the first cakes in China to be made in a mold, influenced by Western baking conventions.

Chinese northerners known it as 槽子糕 (cáo zi gāo).Cáo zi means mold.But for we southerners, it’s simply known as a plain egg cake, 蛋糕 (dàn gāo) or honey cake, 蜂蜜蛋糕 (fēng mì dàn gāo).

During my childhood, I knew of two types of cakes in Shanghai: these old-fashioned cakes and whipped cream cakes (the familiar fruit-topped cakes you’ll see in many Chinese bakeries today, called 奶油蛋糕, nǎiyóu dàngāo, which translates to “butter cake”).As I was developing this recipe, I was chasing the familiar texture and flavor that I remember from that time.  Old-fashioned is Best!  I’ve always been an old-fashioned girl.I prefer old-fashioned donuts—no special toppings or fillings.

And this Chinese Old Fashioned Cake with its original flavor is still my favorite.  I simply love the texture.It has the fi

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