Női szeszély is an old Hungarian recipe, which was very popular decades ago. The origin of its name isn’t known, but the different versions that float around may suggest that the ingredients women used to make this cake depended on their actual (whimsical) mood.

The most varied part of this pastry is the base, some recipes call for a yeasted dough, others make it with a sponge batter. I usually favor yeast dough, but this time I chose an easy recipe of női szeszély with a baking powder batter. All you have to do is to mix up butter, egg yolks, flour and milk. I never baked this cake before, but it could change after this first successful attempt.

Ingredients:

For the cake:

• 50 g (~1 3/4 oz) butter
• 5 egg yolks
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 2 1/2 cups flour
• 15 g (~1/2 oz) baking powder
• 1 1/2 cups milk

For the jam spread:

• 6-7 tbsp apricot jam

For the meringue:

• 1 cup powdered sugar
• 5 egg whites

Size of the baking pan: 23×39 cm / 9×18″

Preheat the oven to 180°C / 356°F. Thoroughly grease and flour a baking pan.

In a bowl whisk egg yolks, sugar and butter together until creamy and fluffy. Add flour, baking powder and milk, and mix together. Pour the batter in the prepared pan and bake for 15 minutes.

Beat the egg whites until foamy, gradually add powdered sugar and keep beating until stiff glossy peaks form. Remove cake from the oven. Spread apricot jam on top, then spread the stiffly beaten egg whites on the jam. Put the cake back in the oven for further 10-12 minutes until meringue becomes nice golden brown. Slice the cake until it’s hot.