Eggs

For cakes or any other food, eggs give flavor, color, structure, and texture, besides naturally contributing to the food’s nutritional value. They have an important function in baking as a leavening agent, often acting as the only source of leavening.

On this website, recipes calling for eggs are designed for those graded “large,” weighing about 2 ounces. Good quality, fresh eggs are necessary for success in baking, you should try to avoid purchasing battery-cage eggs. The yolk of a fresh egg stands high and the white clings to it in a well-formed mass. Eggs can best be beaten to their proper volume when they are at room temperature (around 75˚F). Egg yolks do not freeze well, but whites can be frozen and used as fresh egg whites.

Here’s how to separate an egg: You need three bowls – one for the whites, one for the yolks, and a third small bowl over which the eggs can be broken. Crack the egg and part of the shell gently while holding it over the small bowl. Most of the white will immediately fall into the bowl, but continue carefully to pour the yolk back and forth between the two halves of shell, letting additional white glide into the bowl. Place the yolk into the bowl reserved for yolks, and the white into the one set aside for whites. By using the third small bowl you ensure that if a yolk accidentally breaks into the white it will ruin only one egg, and not all the previously accumulated whites. (Egg whites cannot be properly beaten if the slightest amount of yolk is present.)