Haha thank you for clipping this, I can send this to my DnD group! Also to address the question: yes, it's unfortunately scuffed. Sponges are traditionally made from equal weights of flour, eggs AND sugar AND butter. This was a question I took from an online multiple choice quiz and I clearly didn't do my due diligence. I wrote the quiz in the past week and it was inevitable that some mistakes would creep in, and I just have to own this as my mistake. I legitimately feel terrible that it ended Mark's run. Sorry for taking up your time with a badly-worded question, Mr Mercer! But thank you for being such a good sport.
I was gonna say, following along with the video, I was thinking to myself that butter and sugar are kind of important so for it to be only one? I woulda been as tongue-tied as Mr. Mercer too!
A traditional sponge cake mix is 4,4,4 and 2. 4oz flour, 4oz butter 4oz sugar and 2 eggs. So yes, the question was wrong, but the answer would have been 'both of them'.
Sponge cakes have been around since the 1700s, but they used to beat the life out of eggs. Butter wasn't introduced until the 1800s when baking powder was made (which is why the Victoria sponge came about, the addition of butter). So technically a traditional sponge cake doesn't require butter, even if every sponge cake is better with it and has been for a long time.
Historically sponge had no butter at all, due to lack of baking powder they had to be aerated with whipped egg whites which cant have any fats mixed in. Honestly though I think traditional sponge refers more to a victoria sponge nowadays
Equal parts butter, sugar, eggs and flour would be a pound cake. Leave out the butter for a sponge cake. Leave out the egg yolks for an angel food cake. Not perfect, but the above is close enough. (vanilla extract being the big missing piece)
As revenge, Matt Mercer is going to make a master baker NPC on Critical Role. Maybe even a baking one-shot with the Slayer's Cake. I'd watch that and I know all the Critters would too.
FCG is also in the mix, I can imagine Sam saying something like: 'Do you think me some lowly line cook waiting fearfully of other chefs that pose greater danger and timidly awaiting the day they turn up in my kitchen and ice me? I am the one they fear, I am the danger, I am the one who bakes'
If anything, the 'equal-part eggs' part is iffy bit, not sugar vs butter. I've been baking since childhood and it's always been equal parts sugar, flour and butter/marge in our household, then with say a 4 ounce recipe, we tend to use only 2/3 eggs, with the 3rd egg mostly being optional if you're struggling to stir.
It's pretty standard, and I use recipes that do this, to have your "equal weight" be the weight of your eggs, with the first part of your recipe being to weigh 2-3 eggs. You're working backwards because you have a recipe that is trying to make a specific weight, 4 ounces, but the reason why you'll be using 2-3 eggs is because that's approximately the same weight as the other ingredients in that recipe.
A cake is supposed to be sweet. Neither flour or eggs are sweet, so to me, someone who has never made one of those, it seemed pretty obvious that it of course needs sugar.
i think the phrasing of the question is important, the question says EQUAL parts of flour, eggs and the answer ingredient (butter), so the recipe could include sugar but it wouldnt be the same volume as the other ingredients
It was definitely obvious, baking powder is only ever a teaspoon or less, cornflour and flour would be too much flour, leaving butter and sugar. Sugar is the obvious answer because it needs sweetness, and butter is usually not that much in a cake
I just want to point out that this appears to be a baking nomenclature issue between British English and American English(like biscuits vs. cookies). In America, we call a cake made up of equal parts flour, eggs, sugar, and butter a pound cake(as in one pound of each ingredient). In Britain, it appears that same cake is called a traditional sponge cake. The conflict comes because America also has something called a sponge cake, but that cake involves removing the butter from a pound cake recipe(although the proportions of the remaining ingredients also have to change). So the question used the name and proportions of the British sponge cake, but the ingredient list of the American sponge cake. Most likely it was originally written by a non-baker.
@@HexQuesTT By weight/mass. If you want to be super precise, you start by weighing the eggs you plan to use, then match the rest of ingredients to the mass of the eggs. Or you just approximate. In the US, minimum sizes for eggs are Jumbo(2.5oz), XL(2.25oz), L(2oz), M(1.75oz), or S(1.5oz). In Europe, average egg sizes are XL(78g), L(68g), M(58g), or S(48g). Other countries have different sizes.
I haven't baked anything in years but it has to be sugar. A cake is sweet. Subway bread is defined as a cake in Ireland because the sugar content is too high. Butter does make sense as an ingredient for a cake, but sugar is absolutely necessary.
A sponge has equal parts sugar butter and flour, for example 200g flour, 200g butter, 200g sugar and 4 beaten eggs. So both butter and sugar are both correct
@@rebeccatrishel I'm not a professional baker just a small amount of personal experience and the question felt wrong so I googled sponge recipes and that was the recipe that appeared for both "victoria sponge" and "sponge cake"
@@HexQuesTT Yes you can - by weight. That's what a pound cake is, one pound in weight of each of the four primary ingredients (egg, flour, butter, sugar). Since you must use an integer number of eggs, the ideal way to bake a cake is to first crack your eggs and weigh them and note the weight of the eggs you will be using. Then use an equal weight of the other three ingredients, each of which can be arbitrarily partitioned to match the weight of the eggs.
@@Eddygeek18 That doesn't feel right to me- a sponge cake is suposed to be light, and starts with beating the eggs so it can rise. that much butter would not make it light and fluffy, and when my mom makes a sponge cake base to layer filling between there is no butter involved. Maybe the recipees you googled are just far away from the traditional one the question was about if they're indeed also called sponge cakes? The wikipedia page on sponge cake does not list butter either
I think the whole question is wrong. It should be one of the other ingredients instead of eggs in the question. How do you even measure if it's equal parts egg since the egg is measured in number of eggs and the others in grams or whatever measuring system you're using. A quick search revealed that the recipe is equal parts flour, sugar and butter. 225g softened butter 225g golden caster sugar 4 large eggs ½ lemon, zested 1 tsp vanilla extract 225g self-raising flour splash of milk Optional fillings of lemon curd, jam, lightly whipped cream icing sugar for dusting
The question itself is wrong, your classic sponge cake is the 666 3 equal parts butter sugar and flour, and then 3 eggs I forget in the moment the actual measurement for the 666 part of the cake
quick google 225g softened butter · 225g golden caster sugar · 4 large eggs · ½ lemon, zested · 1 tsp vanilla extract · 225g self-raising flour so both butter and Sugar is right
That's not traditional in the sense they mean, though. Before modern chemical raising agents you'd use plain flour, eggs, and sugar for most cakes plus whatever flavorings (vanilla, lemon, dry fruit, etc) as the whipped eggs would leaven it. You could also use butter (creamed with the sugar) but didn't necessarily depending on the type of cake.
That amount of butter is definitely not traditional. Well think of it this way. It's a cake- without the sugar it is basically bread, 0 sweetness whatsoever.
See, the question is just wrong, it's sugar, butter and flour, how tf would you have an equal part egg??? you can't add half an egg if you're a little under
A pound cake is one pound in weight of each of the four primary ingredients (egg, flour, butter, sugar). Realistically, since you must use an integer number of eggs, in practice the ideal way to bake a cake is to first crack your eggs and weigh them and note the weight of the eggs you will be using. Then use an equal weight of the other three ingredients, each of which can be arbitrarily partitioned to match the weight of the eggs.
Equal parts with butter gives you pound cake. Sugar gives you sponge cake. All the protein and fat makes the cake extra heavy. Sugar provides a spongier fluffier texture.
Haha thank you for clipping this, I can send this to my DnD group!
Also to address the question: yes, it's unfortunately scuffed. Sponges are traditionally made from equal weights of flour, eggs AND sugar AND butter. This was a question I took from an online multiple choice quiz and I clearly didn't do my due diligence. I wrote the quiz in the past week and it was inevitable that some mistakes would creep in, and I just have to own this as my mistake. I legitimately feel terrible that it ended Mark's run.
Sorry for taking up your time with a badly-worded question, Mr Mercer! But thank you for being such a good sport.
I was gonna say, following along with the video, I was thinking to myself that butter and sugar are kind of important so for it to be only one? I woulda been as tongue-tied as Mr. Mercer too!
Traditional sponge cakes don’t have nor need butter☺️
@@MayLina *Everything* needs butter.
A traditional sponge cake mix is 4,4,4 and 2. 4oz flour, 4oz butter 4oz sugar and 2 eggs. So yes, the question was wrong, but the answer would have been 'both of them'.
Sponge cakes have been around since the 1700s, but they used to beat the life out of eggs. Butter wasn't introduced until the 1800s when baking powder was made (which is why the Victoria sponge came about, the addition of butter). So technically a traditional sponge cake doesn't require butter, even if every sponge cake is better with it and has been for a long time.
What a flex for Hulmes to just cast a 7th level Summon Mercer spell in front of everyone
Divine Intervention. Unfortunately the dice gods did not favor him today.
What’s wild is that it put him and Sips into the same tier of celebrity
They've been friends for many years, originally from internet forums IIRC.
@@Zelmel I believe they met at a cosplay covention many years ago and immediately began talking about D&D, as they do. Truly a great friendship
@tmdelacrush Mercer's avatar, in reality, he's a God, you can't just summon a God like that
Respect to the doctor for being able to keep his cool talking to Mat Mercer and British Mat Mercer, I certainly wouldn’t
well he IS a doctor!
This implies that there's a Matt Mercer for every country, and I like that
@@justaghostinthesea I like the idea of a multidimensional Mat Mercer except it’s just him from various different countries
My internal baker screaming because a typical sponge cake has flour, eggs, butter and sugar
isnt it possible to make it without butter tho?
I think the trick might be in the "equal parts" bit (as a complete non-baker) there might be less butter, so it's technically not that?
Historically sponge had no butter at all, due to lack of baking powder they had to be aerated with whipped egg whites which cant have any fats mixed in.
Honestly though I think traditional sponge refers more to a victoria sponge nowadays
That's what I thought!
Equal parts butter, sugar, eggs and flour would be a pound cake. Leave out the butter for a sponge cake. Leave out the egg yolks for an angel food cake.
Not perfect, but the above is close enough. (vanilla extract being the big missing piece)
As revenge, Matt Mercer is going to make a master baker NPC on Critical Role. Maybe even a baking one-shot with the Slayer's Cake. I'd watch that and I know all the Critters would too.
A master baker sounds like a same character
Lord Eshteross!
The shadow baker
FCG is also in the mix, I can imagine Sam saying something like:
'Do you think me some lowly line cook waiting fearfully of other chefs that pose greater danger and timidly awaiting the day they turn up in my kitchen and ice me?
I am the one they fear, I am the danger,
I am the one who bakes'
Well, Ashton did have his little stint away from the party with all the baking and stuff lol
I hope that somebody has forwarded the clip to Matt Mercer already
Well, this was quite a rollercoaster of emotions.
If anything, the 'equal-part eggs' part is iffy bit, not sugar vs butter. I've been baking since childhood and it's always been equal parts sugar, flour and butter/marge in our household, then with say a 4 ounce recipe, we tend to use only 2/3 eggs, with the 3rd egg mostly being optional if you're struggling to stir.
exactly, the question is just straight up wrong, a sponge cake has equal parts flour, butter and sugar
It's pretty standard, and I use recipes that do this, to have your "equal weight" be the weight of your eggs, with the first part of your recipe being to weigh 2-3 eggs. You're working backwards because you have a recipe that is trying to make a specific weight, 4 ounces, but the reason why you'll be using 2-3 eggs is because that's approximately the same weight as the other ingredients in that recipe.
FYI there's a clip of Matt Mercer talking about Mark and their history at the recent PAX Unplugged. Would be a nice companion piece to this video!
A cake is supposed to be sweet. Neither flour or eggs are sweet, so to me, someone who has never made one of those, it seemed pretty obvious that it of course needs sugar.
That doesn't say anything about the quantity. Read the question again, and pay attention to the "equal parts".
i think the phrasing of the question is important, the question says EQUAL parts of flour, eggs and the answer ingredient (butter), so the recipe could include sugar but it wouldnt be the same volume as the other ingredients
It was definitely obvious, baking powder is only ever a teaspoon or less, cornflour and flour would be too much flour, leaving butter and sugar. Sugar is the obvious answer because it needs sweetness, and butter is usually not that much in a cake
That's what the fruit toping is for
They’re Brit’s, cake could have literal mud and Brit’s would be fine with it.
Mark Hulmes summoned the Shadow Baker himself
This actually feels unfair bc both sugar and butter are part of the recipe 😅
I just want to point out that this appears to be a baking nomenclature issue between British English and American English(like biscuits vs. cookies).
In America, we call a cake made up of equal parts flour, eggs, sugar, and butter a pound cake(as in one pound of each ingredient). In Britain, it appears that same cake is called a traditional sponge cake. The conflict comes because America also has something called a sponge cake, but that cake involves removing the butter from a pound cake recipe(although the proportions of the remaining ingredients also have to change).
So the question used the name and proportions of the British sponge cake, but the ingredient list of the American sponge cake. Most likely it was originally written by a non-baker.
yh but also it should be even part flour sugar and butter, how would you even have an even part egg?
@@HexQuesTT By weight/mass. If you want to be super precise, you start by weighing the eggs you plan to use, then match the rest of ingredients to the mass of the eggs. Or you just approximate.
In the US, minimum sizes for eggs are Jumbo(2.5oz), XL(2.25oz), L(2oz), M(1.75oz), or S(1.5oz). In Europe, average egg sizes are XL(78g), L(68g), M(58g), or S(48g). Other countries have different sizes.
And here I was contemplating the validity of my chemistry knowledge for full 10 seconds...
1:1:1:1 < That is the Traditional Spongecake ratio, both sugar and butter are correct...
It was a shame there was a f'up with the question. Reckon Mark would have gotten to J 1m if it werent for that.
I kept flipping between sugar and butter out of confusion only to look it up and realise it takes equal parts of both
@@kingambrose9919 so they were both correct answers? dang, unfortunate for mark
@@SpaceMissile yeah there were a few mess ups throughout and they kept apologising because it was quite complicated for the tech crew to handle
@@kingambrose9919 understandable. live broadcasts have a ton of moving parts.
A classic sponge doesn't include butter. A more modern (1800s) sponge usually does include equal parts butter
I haven't baked anything in years but it has to be sugar. A cake is sweet. Subway bread is defined as a cake in Ireland because the sugar content is too high. Butter does make sense as an ingredient for a cake, but sugar is absolutely necessary.
The moral of the story is... sponge cakes are complicated.
Matt Mercer master of dungeons and bake goods.
This was such a rollercoaster
This question would have thrown me through a loop because the recipe I use needs 4oz of butter, 4oz of sugar, 4oz of flour and 2 medium eggs
Okay. My inner chef is screaming sugar. It's sugar. I looked it up.
A sponge has equal parts sugar butter and flour, for example 200g flour, 200g butter, 200g sugar and 4 beaten eggs. So both butter and sugar are both correct
That's a pound cake!
@@rebeccatrishel I'm not a professional baker just a small amount of personal experience and the question felt wrong so I googled sponge recipes and that was the recipe that appeared for both "victoria sponge" and "sponge cake"
yeah, the question is wrong since you can't have an equal part egg to the other things
@@HexQuesTT Yes you can - by weight. That's what a pound cake is, one pound in weight of each of the four primary ingredients (egg, flour, butter, sugar). Since you must use an integer number of eggs, the ideal way to bake a cake is to first crack your eggs and weigh them and note the weight of the eggs you will be using. Then use an equal weight of the other three ingredients, each of which can be arbitrarily partitioned to match the weight of the eggs.
@@Eddygeek18 That doesn't feel right to me- a sponge cake is suposed to be light, and starts with beating the eggs so it can rise. that much butter would not make it light and fluffy, and when my mom makes a sponge cake base to layer filling between there is no butter involved.
Maybe the recipees you googled are just far away from the traditional one the question was about if they're indeed also called sponge cakes? The wikipedia page on sponge cake does not list butter either
I always think of butter as mainly an American thing, for whatever reason.
I think the whole question is wrong. It should be one of the other ingredients instead of eggs in the question. How do you even measure if it's equal parts egg since the egg is measured in number of eggs and the others in grams or whatever measuring system you're using.
A quick search revealed that the recipe is equal parts flour, sugar and butter.
225g softened butter
225g golden caster sugar
4 large eggs
½ lemon, zested
1 tsp vanilla extract
225g self-raising flour
splash of milk
Optional fillings of lemon curd, jam, lightly whipped cream
icing sugar for dusting
I actually knew it was sugar
what a chaotic experience
I thought someone called Matt Mercer a millionaire on Yogscast.
how are you expecting the cake to be sweet if its just made of flour eggs and butter, need sugar
Max level summon dm.
The question itself is wrong, your classic sponge cake is the 666 3 equal parts butter sugar and flour, and then 3 eggs I forget in the moment the actual measurement for the 666 part of the cake
Did someone cast a 9th level wish and summon him?
quick google 225g softened butter · 225g golden caster sugar · 4 large eggs · ½ lemon, zested · 1 tsp vanilla extract · 225g self-raising flour
so both butter and Sugar is right
That's not traditional in the sense they mean, though. Before modern chemical raising agents you'd use plain flour, eggs, and sugar for most cakes plus whatever flavorings (vanilla, lemon, dry fruit, etc) as the whipped eggs would leaven it. You could also use butter (creamed with the sugar) but didn't necessarily depending on the type of cake.
That amount of butter is definitely not traditional. Well think of it this way. It's a cake- without the sugar it is basically bread, 0 sweetness whatsoever.
@@Zelmel How do you know what they mean by traditional?
Does Mr. Hulmes have a new channel? He hasn't posted in months
Just busy with events and the High Rollers DND work. :)
You made a wrong question and eveyone knows that, because it is exactly the question in the Mercer cameo video... well that's a natural 1
See, the question is just wrong, it's sugar, butter and flour, how tf would you have an equal part egg??? you can't add half an egg if you're a little under
A pound cake is one pound in weight of each of the four primary ingredients (egg, flour, butter, sugar). Realistically, since you must use an integer number of eggs, in practice the ideal way to bake a cake is to first crack your eggs and weigh them and note the weight of the eggs you will be using. Then use an equal weight of the other three ingredients, each of which can be arbitrarily partitioned to match the weight of the eggs.
@scottclowe yh but this is a sponge cake ya fuckin yank
Equal parts with butter gives you pound cake. Sugar gives you sponge cake. All the protein and fat makes the cake extra heavy. Sugar provides a spongier fluffier texture.
Did he age like 20years ?
This dude's mouth looks like that of ricky gervais.
Why so much disrespect?
It's what the brittish refer to as 'banter', especially common between friends and colleagues who know each other well.
It's what the brittish refer to as 'banter', especially common between friends and colleagues who know each other well.
It's what the brittish refer to as 'banter', especially common between friends and colleagues who know each other well.
It's what the brittish refer to as 'banter', especially common between friends and colleagues who know each other well.