Instructions: Angel food cake used to be ho-hum until someone marketed it as the no-fat treasure of the cake world. Then it became a rage. Again.

Angel food cake was a favorite White House dessert in the 1800s. The cake is said to have been originally a Pennsylvania Dutch specialty and contains no solid fat or egg yolk to tenderize the crumb. With its sponge-like delicate texture and incredible versatility, pure white angel food cake has stepped into the 21st century intact.

I love the names for the different types of angel food cake: Hells Angel

(made with brown sugar), Dream Angel (frosted with whipped cream), Snow Angel

(with coconut and coconut extract), and Little Angels (made in mini-Bundt or tube pans).

Angel food cakes can be made with all sorts of spice flavorings and extracts, but the basic proportions remain constant. They are also a wonderful venue for chunks of white or dark chocolate. My sister Meg layers her angel food cake with defrosted sweetened raspberries and ices the whole thing with white chocolate whipped cream for a fantastic birthday cake. With the addition of cocoa powder, a lovely low-cholesterol chocolate angel food cake can be made.

The secret to a good from-scratch angel food cake is beating the egg whites until they are so airy that they stand on their own. First, let your eggs sit out of the refrigerator for 30 minutes before you separate them. If you rush this, I guarantee you will not get a great cake. Also when separating the eggs, make sure no yolk gets into those whites. A dab of yolk can ruin a whole cake. I separate each egg into a small bowl, then pour it into the mixing bowl.

At all stages, you want to keep the whites from deflating. This is beautifully accomplished with the electric mixers we have in our modern kitchens, but early recipes call for laborious hand beating.

There are three distinct stages in beating the whites for this type of cake: First, the room temperature egg whites are beaten until frothy with a beater or whisk attachment that is spotlessly clean. If theres even a trace of butter or oil on the beater or in the bowl, you wont have nicely beaten whites. Now the salt and the all-important cream of tartar (which adds stability and volume - beating egg whites in a copper bowl has the same effect) can be added.

Then, beat on high speed until the whites form soft, billowy peaks when the beater is raised up. While the machine is beating, the fine granulated sugar is sprinkled in in a steady shower. Slow is the key here; add it a tablespoon at a time, to keep the egg whites from breaking down. This makes a classic, sturdy mixture known as a meringue. After the sugar is added, incorporate the extracts.

The other ingredients are ever-so-gently folded in with a rubber spatula, a balloon whisk or very slowly right with the mixer, so that the egg whites retain their full volume. It is the egg whites that give the lift that will allow the cake to double in the oven without any leavening.

Please use cake flour, which is bleached, since it holds the high proportion of sugar in an angel food cake just right and makes it nice and tender.

All-purpose flour just wont rise as high.

The shiny metal two-piece angel food cake pan with the tube in the middle is easy to find; even supermarkets often carry them. It is such a common kitchen pan that even people who dont bake seem to own one. It is always used ungreased, since the cake literally climbs its sides while baking. The tube allows heat to reach the center of the cake and makes for a very evenly baked delight.

Friends have baked this batter in cake pans, just for fun, but the cake doesnt perform as well outside of its traditional pan. Its better to leave well enough alone, although you can use a Bundt pan, which would have to be greased.

The tube also performs another function out of the oven. The cake must be inverted during cooling to keep that lovely height or it will sink mercilessly.

Usually there are three little feet on the pan edge, but if your cake is extra high, just invert the funnel onto a full soda or wine bottle for about 1 1/2 hours.

With their high, fluffy texture, angel food cakes can be tough to cut without squishing them. Some cookbooks say to cut angel food cakes by tearing them apart with two forks. My mothers utensil drawer contained a gadget called a cake breaker that looked like a pronged Afro comb. It was supposed to tear the cake to perfection, but I never saw her use it. I find that a good serrated knife and a gentle back-and-forth sawing motion works better. Just never press down. Plain

(unfilled) cakes keep two to three days at room temperature and a week in the fridge.

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