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"Groom's Cake"
1/2 pound Cottolene. 1 pound brown sugar rolled.
Yolks 12 eggs well beaten. 1 teaspoon cloves. 2½ pounds seeded raisins. 3 pounds currants. 1 pound citron thinly sliced and cut in shreds. 1/2 pound candied cherries cut in quarters. ¼ pound candied orange peel finely chopped. 2 cups N. O. Molasses. 1 pound flour. 1/2 tablespoon cinnamon. 1/2 tablespoon mace. 1 teaspoon salt. 1 teaspoon soda.
Whites 12 eggs beaten stiff. 1/4 cup brandy. ¼ pound candied lemon peel finely chopped.
Supplementary Recipes PROCESS: Cream Cottolene, add sugar gradually, stirring constantly; add egg yolks, continue stirring and beating, add molasses, flour mixed and sifted with spices, salt and soda; fold in the whites of eggs and lastly add the fruit except citron. Turn mixture into a well-greased pan lined with several thicknesses of heavy paper, put citron into mixture in layers, having a layer of batter on top. Divide the mixture equally in two tube pans, eight inches in diameter, filling pans two-thirds full. Bake two and three-quarter hours.
A dark fruitcake of the old wedding-breakfast type, built on a pound of flour and better than six pounds of dried and candied fruit. The ingredient list has quirks that need sorting before you start.
- The fat is not givenThe method begins "Cream Cottolene" but no quantity appears in the list. Cottolene was a cottonseed-oil and beef-suet shortening. Treat the figure as missing rather than assumed; the recipe gives no guide to how much.
- Candied peel quantitiesThe orange peel and lemon peel are both written as "14 pound." Both are almost certainly 1/4 pound.
- N. O. MolassesNew Orleans molasses: a light cane molasses, generally reckoned sweeter and lighter than blackstrap. Ordinary unsulphured molasses is the nearest modern equivalent; blackstrap would overwhelm the spices.
- Soda, not baking powderOne teaspoon of soda with two cups of molasses is the whole leavening; the acid in the molasses does the work. Sift it with the flour and spices as directed rather than dissolving it separately.
- Oven heatNo temperature is given. A rich fruitcake of this size wants a slow oven, 275-300F, for the stated two and three-quarter hours. Anything hotter will set the crust long before the centre cooks.
- The paper lining mattersSeveral thicknesses of heavy paper is not fussiness. It is insulation for a nearly three-hour bake; parchment plus a brown-paper collar tied round the outside of the pan does the same job.
- Citron in layersCitron is heavy and sinks. Holding it back and laying it in bands through the batter, with plain batter on top, keeps it suspended and gives the sliced cake its striped look.
- The brandyA quarter cup of brandy is listed but never appears in the method, and it falls in the list beside the bride's cake heading, so it may not belong to this cake at all. If used, it can be beaten in with the molasses or brushed over the baked cakes while they cool.
- Yield and keepingTwo eight-inch tube cakes, each substantial. Fruitcakes of this richness were wrapped and stored for weeks.
Wedding feasts of the period called for two cakes: the bride's cake, pale and made with the whites of the eggs, and the groom's cake, dark with molasses, spice and pounds of dried fruit, made with the yolks. Pairing them was economical as much as symbolic, since one recipe used what the other discarded, and the two are printed together here for exactly that reason. The groom's cake was traditionally the one cut into small pieces, boxed, and sent home with guests, which is why it is built to keep. The book itself comes from the era when shortening manufacturers published cookery collections to promote their product, and Cottolene, a cottonseed-oil shortening, stands in the method where an earlier cook would have written butter.