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White Nut Cake
Follow the proportions and directions given in the preceding recipe, adding three-fourths cupful of coarsely chopped walnut or pecan nut meats to the dry ingredients. ¾ Cupful Sugar 6 Tablespoonfuls Snowdrift 3 Eggs 1 Teaspoonful Desired Extract 1¾ Cupfuls Flour ⅛ Teaspoonful Salt 21/2 Teaspoonfuls Baking Powder ½ Cupful Milk
This is a white butter-style cake made with vegetable shortening rather than butter, with nuts folded into the dry ingredients. The ingredient list carries over from the plain white cake it refers back to.
- SnowdriftSnowdrift was a cottonseed-oil shortening marketed by the Southern Cotton Oil Company, which appears to be the sponsor of this book; shortenings of this brand were hydrogenated by the 1920s. Any modern solid vegetable shortening works in the same proportion; butter can be substituted in the same amount, though the crumb will be less white and slightly less tender.
- The fractionsRead the quantities as 3/4 cupful sugar, 1 3/4 cupfuls flour, 1/8 teaspoonful salt and 2 1/2 teaspoonfuls baking powder. The milk figure looks garbled as printed: 1 1/2 cupfuls would be far too much for this amount of flour, and something nearer 1/2 cupful seems more likely.
- Baking powderTwo and a half teaspoonfuls for under two cups of flour is on the generous side by current standards. Two teaspoonfuls of a modern double-acting powder may give a better result.
- MethodThe preceding recipe would have had you cream the shortening with the sugar, beat in the eggs, then add the sifted dry ingredients alternately with the milk. Fold the nuts in with the last of the flour so they stay suspended rather than sinking.
- Whites or whole eggs"White" cakes of this period were often made with egg whites only. Three whole eggs as listed will give a pale yellow crumb; if you want the cake genuinely white, use the whites of four or five eggs, beaten stiff and folded in last.
- Extract"Desired extract" means vanilla, almond or lemon, at the cook's discretion.
- Oven and panThe recipe as printed gives no oven temperature, pan or timing. A moderate oven of about 350F is a reasonable modern equivalent; the quantity should fill two 8-inch round layers (about 20 to 25 minutes) or one 8-inch square pan (about 35 to 40 minutes).
Snowdrift cook books were promotional literature, issued under the Southern Cotton Oil Company's name to persuade households that cottonseed shortening could replace butter and lard in everything from pie crust to layer cake. The recipes are arranged in families, one plain formula followed by variations, so a cook who learned the base white cake could produce a nut cake from the same instructions. Walnuts and pecans were an obvious addition in the American South, where pecans were widely grown.