The first time an angel cake recipe appears in the USA is in an 1839 book by Lettice Bryan entitled “The Kentucky Housewife”. It seems that the wife of American President Rutherford B. Hayes was very fond of it.
This is a very soft cake prepared only with egg whites and without adding butter or oil. The only drawback is that you have to use a specific pan that has feet on the edge in order to let the cake cool upside down and remain tall and bulky.
At Christmas I always have a lot of egg whites left over, especially when I prepare panettone and pandoro at home. This is a yummy trick for recycling them.

Coffee Angel Cake

  • Preparation time: 60 minutes
  • Ingredients for 8 servings
  • Difficulty: Average difficulty recipe

  • Ingredients
  • 360 g or 1 ½ cups of egg whites
  • 300 g or 1 ½ cups of sugar
  • 5 g or 1 teaspoon of cream of tartar
  • 5 g or 1 teaspoon of instant (soluble) coffee
  • 150 g or 1 cup of all-purpose flour
  • 12 g or 1 tablespoon of coffee liqueur
  • 50 g or 2 oz of chocolate chips
  • A pinch of salt
  • 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
  1. Instructions
  2. Heat the oven to at 350°F.
  3. Heat the egg whites up to 113°F in a bain-marie, stirring carefully with a whisk to avoid cooking them.
  4. Pour the egg whites into the mixer and whip them together with half of the sugar and all the instant (soluble) coffee until they form stiff peaks.
  5. In a bowl, sift together flour, salt, the remaining sugar, and cream of tartar.
  6. Gently combine the egg whites with the dry ingredients.
  7. Add the liqueur, vanilla, and chocolate chips.
  8. Pour the mixture into the Chiffon Cake pan and bake in the oven for thirty-five minutes.
  9. Turn the cake upside down until cool.

Tips to ensure the success of the dish:

  • It would be better to beat the egg whites with an electric whisk at a low speed. It takes a few more minutes, but this means the dough is more stable and doesn’t immediately collapse once the other ingredients are added.
  • Cream of tartar has leavening properties and is, in this case, a stabilizer for whipped egg whites.
  • The timing of cooking in the oven is indicative because each oven cooks differently. I always do the “toothpick baking test”, even if I know my oven very well by now.