Apricot Piskóta

Directions

1. Wash, dry, halve and trim apricots and set aside.
2. Butter 9 x 13” baking dish and dust with flour, removing all excess flour and set aside.
3. Mix flour and baking powder and set aside.
4. Separate eggs; yolks and whites in two separate bowls. Whites should go in large mixing bowl.
5. Beat butter with sugar and vanilla sugar well, scraping sides of bowl to help incorporate for approximately 5 to 7 minutes.
6. Add egg yolks, one at a time until each incorporates into batter. Scrape sides of mixing bowl to help incorporate. Then mix for approximately 10 minutes.
7. While egg/sugar batter is mixing, beat the egg whites and salt in the separate bowl with electric hand held mixer until stiff peaks form and set aside.
8. Add blended flour and baking powder through flour sifter or sieve to egg/sugar batter while mixer is going until just mixed. Scrape sides to incorporate dry ingredients into wet. Be careful to not over mix.
9. Transfer batter into stiff egg whites and fold batter into egg whites, being careful to not collapse egg whites while also incorporating batter and egg whites evenly.
10. Carefully transfer batter to prepped baking dish, still being careful not to collapse foam.
11. Smooth batter evenly and gently place apricots over the top of the batter. Do not press apricots down into batter.
12. Bake in preheated 350F for approximately 25 minutes. Once baking has begun, do not open oven door for first 15 to 20 minutes to prevent collapse of batter.
13. Cake is ready when a tooth pick comes out clean when inserted and removed from center of cake.