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Dessert Cakes
Beat a quarter of a pound of butter to a cream, and add to it gradually an equal weight of finely-sifted sugar, and the same of ground rice, and as much baking powder as would cover a sixpence. Mix thoroughly, then stir in three well-beaten eggs. Pour into well-oiled tins, and bake in a good oven. Time to bake, ten minutes. Sufficient for one dozen cakes. Probable cost, 8d.
A small, plain creamed batter of equal weights butter, sugar and ground rice, baked in patty tins. It works, but two of its instructions need translating before you start.
- Ground rice is rice flourGround rice was sold coarser than modern rice flour but the two are interchangeable here; fine white rice flour gives a smoother crumb, coarser ground rice a faint sandiness that was part of the appeal. There is no wheat flour in the recipe at all, so the cakes are incidentally gluten-free.
- "As much as would cover a sixpence"A Victorian sixpence was about three-quarters of an inch across. A small mound on a coin that size is roughly 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder, a modest dose for 4 oz of dry ingredients. Treat the upper figure as the maximum; more may leave a soapy taste in so plain a batter.
- The weightsA quarter pound each of butter, sifted sugar and ground rice, so 4 oz (about 115 g) of each, plus three eggs. Eggs sold today are often larger than those such books assumed; if the batter looks slack, two large eggs and one yolk is closer to the intent.
- "A good oven"The book gives no temperatures. A well-heated oven of roughly 375-400F (190-200C) is the usual modern reading, and ten minutes is only plausible at that sort of heat and in small tins.
- TinsThese are most likely bun or patty tins rather than a single cake pan, and one dozen from this quantity means shallow cups of roughly two to three tablespoons each. Paper cases work; if you oil metal tins as directed, use a light neutral oil or melted butter and do it thoroughly, as a rice batter with no wheat gluten tears easily on turning out.
- Creaming matters more than usualWith no wheat flour to build structure, all the lift comes from air beaten into the butter and eggs plus the small dose of baking powder. Beat the butter and sugar until genuinely pale and light, and add the beaten eggs gradually so the mixture does not curdle.
- Testing and yieldTwelve small cakes; they are done when the tops are pale gold and spring back, and they will stay much paler than a wheat sponge. Cool them in the tins for a few minutes before lifting, as they are fragile while hot.
Cassell's places this among a long run of small "dessert" cakes meant for the last course rather than the tea table, where a dozen plain sweet mouthfuls could be sent up at the end of a meal. The pound-cake logic behind it, equal weights of butter, sugar and starch bound with eggs, is often said to be the usual Victorian household formula, adjusted here by swapping wheat flour for ground rice. Rice flour was cheap, kept well, and produced the short, slightly granular crumb that nineteenth-century cooks valued in biscuits and small cakes; it appears in British recipe books of the period for exactly that reason. The "probable cost, 8d" is characteristic of Cassell's, which priced almost every recipe so a mistress or cook could budget a meal in advance, and it puts a dozen of these cakes at well under a shilling.