(French Savoie, biscuit de Savoie), a type of sponge cake. This differs from the other main type, Génoise, in having egg yolks and whites beaten separately rather than together. The yolks are beaten with sugar; then flour (in modern recipes, half wheat and half potato) is folded in, and the stiffly beaten egg whites. Vanilla and lemon rind may be added as flavourings. The result is a light and delicate cake, eaten without further adornment. The Italian pan di Spagna is similar but contains less sugar.
The same sort of mixture can be used to produce small biscuits. There can be confusion here, since the word biscuit has two senses in French. As noted above it can mean a cake. But in the plural it can mean much the same as English ‘biscuits’.
The Savoy biscuit arrived in England early in the 18th century. However, it did not arrive alone. Other similar ‘biscuits’, named according to their supposed origins— Naples, Lisbon, or Spanish biscuit—also became popular in England at that time, and the differences between them, if differences there were, no doubt perplexed people then as they do now.
When Mrs Mary Eales gave a recipe for ‘spunge biscuits’ in her Receipts (1718), the situation became clearer, since this phrase conveys to British ears the correct impression, whereas terms such as ‘Savoy biscuit’ suggest something different. Moreover, Mrs Eales specified that the biscuits should be baked ‘in little long Pans’, which corresponds to the shape of modern sponge fingers (or boudoir biscuits).
Alan Davidson was a distinguished author and publisher, and one of the world's best-known writers on fish and fish cookery. In 1975 he retired early from the diplomatic service—after serving in, among other places, Washington, Egypt, Tunisia, and Laos, where he was British Ambassador—to pursue a fruitful second career as a food historian and food writer extraordinaire. Among his popular books are Seafood of South-East Asia, North Atlantic Seafood, and Mediterranean Seafood. In 2003, shortly before his death, he was awarded the Erasmus Prize for his contribution to European culture.
