NEVER undertake cake unless you are willing to give to the business the amount of time and labor needed to make it well. Materials tossed together “anyhow” may, once in a great while, come out right, but the manufacturer has no right to expect this, or to be mortified when the product is a failure.

Before breaking an egg, or putting butter and sugar together, collect all your ingredients. Sift the flour and arrange close to your hand, the bowls, egg-beater, cake-moulds, ready buttered, etc.

Begin by putting the measured sugar into a bowl, and working the butter into it with a wooden spoon. Warm the butter slightly in cold weather. Rub and stir until the mixture is as smooth and light, as cream. Indeed, this process is called “creaming.”

Now, beat the yolks of your eggs light and thick in another bowl; wash the egg-beater well, wipe dry and let it get cold before whipping the whites to a standing heap in a third vessel. Keep the eggs cool before and while you beat them. Add the yolks to the creamed butter and sugar, beating hard one minute; put in the milk when milk is used, the spices and flavoring; whip in the whites, and lastly, the sifted and prepared flour.

Beat from the bottom of the mixing-bowl with a wooden spoon, bringing it up full and high with each stroke, and as soon as the ingredients are fairly and smoothly mixed, stop beating, or your cake will be tough.

Let your first attempt be with cup-cake baked in small tins. Learn to manage your oven well before risking pound or fruit-cake.

Should the dough or batter rise very fast lay white paper over the top, that this may not harden into a crust before the middle is done. To ascertain whether the cake is ready to leave the oven, thrust a clean straw into the thickest part. If it comes out clean, take out the tins and set them gently on a table or shelf to cool before turning them upside down on a clean, dry cloth or dish.

A Good Cup-cake.

Two teaspoonfuls of baking powder will serve the same end. Mix as directed in “Practical Preliminaries,” and bake in small tins.

Jelly-cake

Is made by mixing the above cup-cake, leaving out the flavoring, and baking it in “jelly-cake tins,” turning these out when almost cold by running a knife around the edges, and spreading all but that intended for the top with a thick coating of fruit-jelly. Sift white sugar over the upper one or frost it.

Cream-cake.

Mix a cup-cake without spice or other flavoring, bake in jelly-cake tins, and when cold spread between the layers this filling:

Scald the milk in a farina-kettle; wet the cornstarch with a little cold milk and stir into that over the fire until it thickens. Have the egg ready whipped light into a bowl; beat it in the sugar; pour the thick hot milk upon this, gradually, stirring fast, return to the kettle and boil (still stirring,) to a thick custard. Let it cool before seasoning.

Frost the top-cake, or sift powdered sugar over it.

Cocoanut-cake.

Mix and bake as for jelly-cake, flavoring with rose-water.

Whip the whites of three eggs to a stiff froth.

Add one cup of powdered sugar, and two thirds of a grated cocoanut.

When the cakes are cold, spread between the layers.

To the remaining third of the cocoanut add four tablespoonfuls of powdered sugar, and cover the top of the cake with it.

Apple-cake.

Mix and bake as for jelly-cake, flavoring the dough with essence of bitter almond.

Beat one egg light in a bowl, and into it a cup of sugar. Add to this the strained juice and grated rind of a lemon.

Peel and grate three fine pippins or other ripe, tart apples directly into this mixture, stirring each well in before adding another. When all are in, put into a farina-kettle and stir over the fire until the apple-custard is boiling hot and quite thick. Cool and spread between the cakes. A nice and simple cake. Eat the day it is baked.

Chocolate-cake.

Mix and bake as for jelly-cake, flavoring with vanilla. For filling, whip the whites of three eggs stiff; stir in one cup and a half of sugar and four tablespoonfuls of Baker’s Vanilla Chocolate, grated. Beat hard for two minutes and spread between the layers and on the top of the cake.

White Cup-cake.

Cream butter and sugar; add milk and beat hard before putting in the whites of the eggs. Stir in flavoring and, lightly and quickly, the prepared flour. Bake in small tins.

Frosting for Cake.

Put the whites into a cold bowl and add the sugar at once, stirring it in thoroughly. Then whip with your egg-beater until the mixture is stiff and white, adding lemon-juice as you go on. Spread thickly over the cake, and set in the sun, or in a warm room to dry.

White Lemon Cake.

Make “white cup-cake,” bake in jelly cake-tins and let it get cold. Prepare a frosting as above directed, but use the juice of two lemons and the grated peel of one. Spread this mixture between the cakes and on the top.

Sponge Cake.

Do not attempt this until you have had some practice in the management of ovens, and let your first trial be with what are sometimes termed “snow-balls,”—that is, small sponge cakes, frosted. Put six eggs into a scale and ascertain their weight exactly. Allow for the sponge cake the weight of the eggs in sugar, and half their weight in flour. Grate the yellow peel from a lemon and squeeze the juice upon it. Let it stand ten minutes, and strain through coarse muslin, pressing out every drop.

Beat the yolks of the eggs very light and then the sugar into them; the lemon-juice; the whites, which should have been whipped to a standing froth;—finally, stir in the sifted flour swiftly and lightly. Bake in a steady oven from twenty-five to thirty minutes, glancing at them now and then, to make sure they are not scorching, and covering with white paper as they harden on top.

This is an easy, and if implicitly obeyed, a sure receipt.

Nice Gingerbread.

Put butter, molasses, sugar and spice in a bowl, set in a pan of hot water and stir with a wooden spoon until they are like brown cream. Take from the water and add the milk. Beat yolks and whites together until light in another bowl, and turn the brown mixture gradually in upon them, keeping the egg-beater going briskly.

When well-mixed, add the soda, at last, the flour. Beat hard three minutes, and bake in well-buttered pans.

Sugar Cookies.

Cream butter and sugar, beat in the whipped eggs and spice; add a handful at a time the flour, working it in until the dough is stiff enough to roll out. Flour your hands well and sprinkle flour over a pastry-board. Make a ball of the dough, and lay it on the board. Rub your rolling-pin also with flour and roll out the dough into a sheet about a quarter of an inch thick.

Cut into round cakes; sift granulated sugar over each and bake quickly.

Ginger Snaps.

Stir molasses, sugar and butter together in a bowl set in hot water, until very light. Mix in spices and flour, and roll out as directed in last receipt, but in a thinner sheet. Cut into small cakes and bake quickly.

All cakes in the composition of which molasses is used, are more apt to burn than others. Watch your ginger snaps well, but opening the oven as little as may be.

These spicy and toothsome cakes are better the second day than the first, and keep well for a week or more.

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