Japanese Castella: Lovely tea time treat!

 Well, a request again, hehe. Japanese Castella, a close relative to sponge cake, but it contains a lot of sugar.

 And because of the sugar, the top part of the cake is dark (the sugar caramelized), but the texture of the cake is very soft, it's the signature of this kind of cake. I made it a long time ago, but when someone asked me about it, I thought, I should try it again ^^.
Starting by whipping the egg over the hot water until warm, and your cake will have small bubble (rather than big one), the texture will be beautiful. Even the cake needed long baking time, but the last part you will bake it in Bain-marie (water bath), so the cake is not dry but it's very moist instead. 
The honey that you use is very important too, the fragrance of the honey is the fragrance of the cake, sweet smell that lingers in your kitchen while baking, ^^. I use Langnese wild flower honey (I love it, the smell is very good), anyway, you can use anything you like. 
The cake is sweet, so it great to serve with a cup of tea (strong one for me please, haha), but don't think about reducing the sugar, if you don't like sweet cake, make other recipe will be better choice. 
PS. You can read about the cake from Wikipedia, here. 

Japanese Castella 

Makes 18x18 cm cake

120g ................................ Cake flour
3 ...................................... Eggs
180g ................................ Sugar
2tbsp ............................... Honey
2tbsp ............................... Milk
2 1/2 tbsp ....................... Oil (I use rice barn oil)

Preheat the oven to 180°C
Line 18cm square pan with baking paper, and place in a 23cm pan.
Sift the cake flour twice, set aside.
Mix the milk and oil together.

Fill a sauce pan with water, and place over medium heat until boiled, lower the heat and let it simmering.
Put the eggs in a bowl and place the bowl over sauce pan, whisk all the time until the temperature is about 60°C
Take the egg bowl out of the heat and slowly whisk in the sugar in 3 additions.
Whisk in the honey, then fold in the milk and oil mixture (you can use a spatula or a whisk).

Fold the flour with the spatula. 
Pour into the prepared pan and bake for 20 minutes.
Lower the oven temperature to 160°C and pour hot water into 23cm pan.
Bake for 30-40 minutes more.

Japanese Castella: Lovely tea time treat!