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Mixture for the Cakes
One cup grated chocolate, one cup milk, one teaspoon corn starch, dissolved in it; yolk of one egg, one cup sugar, boil until thick; put between the cakes and around them, letting the frosting extend about one inch on the cake, then make a frosting of the white of one egg for the center of the cake. This makes a handsome looking and a good cake.
This is a filling and frosting for a layer cake rather than the cake itself — a cooked chocolate pudding thickened with cornstarch and egg yolk, spread between the layers and about an inch in from the edge, with a plain white icing left in the middle. A few of the assumptions behind it need translating.
- "Grated chocolate"This means unsweetened block chocolate grated on a box grater, not cocoa powder and not chips. A cup of gratings is roughly 3 to 4 oz by weight; chop or grate it fine so it melts before the milk comes to a boil.
- The hinge: cook it gently and stir constantlyOne yolk, one teaspoon cornstarch and a cup of milk is a thin custard-starch mixture that will scramble or scorch if pushed hard over direct heat. Whisk the cornstarch into the cold milk first, add the yolk off the heat, then bring it up slowly, stirring the bottom of the pan the whole time.
- "Boil until thick"Cornstarch needs to reach a full bubbling boil to lose its raw taste and set properly, but a minute or so at that point is enough; prolonged hard boiling can thin the mixture again as the starch breaks down.
- Consistency to aim forIt should coat a spoon heavily and hold a line when you draw a finger through it. It thickens considerably as it cools, so pull it while it still flows.
- Sugar quantityA cup of sugar to a cup of milk is a period sweetness level, built to carry unsweetened chocolate. If you use anything semi-sweet, cut the sugar to about half a cup or the filling will be cloying.
- The white-of-egg frostingThis is an uncooked icing: one egg white beaten stiff with enough sifted confectioners' sugar to hold shape, about a cup to a cup and a half. Because it is never heated, use pasteurized whites or dried egg white powder if serving anyone who should avoid raw egg.
- AssemblySpread the chocolate mixture between the layers and around the top edge, extending about an inch in from the rim and leaving the centre bare — the original wants a band of chocolate around a white centre. Let the chocolate cool and firm before piling the white icing in the middle, or the two will bleed together.
- YieldThe original gives no pan size or number of servings; the quantity is about right to fill and top a modest two-layer cake.
Nineteenth-century American cake books often separated the cake from what went on it, printing "mixtures," "fillings" and "icings" as standalone entries a cook could pair with any plain layer cake she already knew — which is why this page gives no flour, no butter and no oven. The finish described here is a two-tone one, a dark chocolate border with a white centre. Chocolate itself was still sold mainly in hard unsweetened cakes to be grated, and the cornstarch is a mark of the period as well: commercial corn starch became widely available in American groceries in the second half of the century and came to be used for custards and fillings as a cheaper, more reliable thickener than eggs alone.