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Athole Cakes (very Good)
Mix two table-spoonfuls of finely-sifted sugar, with half a pound of maize-meal, and a heaped tea-spoonful of the best baking-powder. Shred finely the thin rind of a lemon and a small piece of candied peel. Stir in another bowl six ounces of butter to a cream, mix with it the above ingredients, and last of all, add two well-beaten eggs. Well oil patty-pans, put a piece about the size of a walnut into each, and bake in a good oven for five or six minutes. Probable cost, 1s. Sufficient for two dozen cakes.
A very short ingredient list with no liquid at all — the moisture comes entirely from the butter and eggs, so the mixture is a stiff paste rather than a batter. Weigh rather than measure by volume where you can.
- Maize-mealUse fine yellow cornmeal, not coarse polenta or grits. Half a pound is about 225 g, roughly 1 1/2 cups; anything coarse stays gritty because there is no liquid and no resting time to hydrate it.
- There is no wheat flourThe recipe is naturally gluten-free, which also means there is no structure beyond egg and butter. The cakes will be short and crumbly and should be lifted from the tins only after they have firmed up.
- "A good oven"The book gives no temperatures, and the term is not defined here; a moderately hot oven, somewhere around 375-400F/190-200C, is a reasonable modern reading. Small cakes of this size want the heat high enough to set the outside before the butter runs.
- The timing is optimisticThe timing looks short -- five or six minutes may not be enough for walnut-sized pieces of butter-rich paste. Be prepared to give them longer, and judge by a set top and lightly coloured edges.
- Patty-pansThese are small shallow tartlet or bun tins — a mini-muffin tin is the closest modern equivalent. "Well oil" is worth taking literally, or use paper cases, as there is no flour to help release.
- Creaming orderCream the butter alone first, then work in the dry mixture, then the eggs, following the order the recipe gives.
- Sugar and peelTwo tablespoons of sifted sugar for 24 cakes makes these barely sweet by modern standards; the candied peel and lemon rind carry most of the flavour. Increase the sugar if you want something closer to a modern bun.
- YieldTwo dozen small cakes, as stated. They are likely to be best eaten the day they are baked.
Atholl is a district of highland Perthshire, and the name attaches to several Scottish confections, the best known being Atholl brose, the whisky, honey and oatmeal drink traditionally associated with the Murrays, Dukes of Atholl. Whether these cakes have any real connection to the place or simply borrowed a fashionable Scottish name is not documented. What is notable is the substitution at their heart: maize-meal in place of wheat flour. Imported maize became substantially cheaper and more widely available in Britain over the later nineteenth century, and recipes using it appear alongside wheat-flour ones in the household books of the period.