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Jam Sandwiches
Mix the yolks of 2 eggs very smoothly with a tablespoonful of flour and a tablespoonful of ground rice; add a very small pinch of salt, a tablespoonful of sugar, half a pint of thick cream, and a quarter of a pint of new milk. Beat the whites of the eggs to a firm froth, add them last of all, and beat the mixture for four or five minutes. Butter 2 large plates, put in the mixture, and bake in a quick oven until it is set and lightly browned. Spread a little jam over one of the cakes and lay the other upon it, the browned part uppermost. Sift a little sugar over it before serving. Jam sandwiches may be eaten either hot or cold. Time, twenty minutes to bake.
A thin, custardy batter baked in two shallow rounds and joined with jam — closer to a set pancake than a sponge. The batter is very loose, so the vessel matters more than anything else here.
- The hinge: use rimmed pans"Two large plates" means shallow ovenproof dishes, not flat dinner plates. Two 8- to 9-inch pie plates or shallow cake tins, well buttered, will hold this thin batter; anything flatter will let it run.
- Quick ovenRoughly 400-425F. The twenty minutes given assumes a brisk heat, enough to set the custard and colour the top without drying it.
- Ground riceA coarse-milled rice flour. The finer the grind, the smoother the finished cake; a coarse pudding-grade ground rice will leave a slight grain.
- New milkSimply fresh whole milk, unskimmed and unsoured. Nothing available today needs substituting.
- Pint measuresThis is a British book, so a pint is 20 fluid ounces: half a pint of cream is about 1 1/4 cups, a quarter pint of milk about 2/3 cup. Use heavy or double cream for "thick cream."
- Folding the whites"Beat the mixture for four or five minutes" after adding the whipped whites will knock most of the air straight back out. Fold them in instead; the batter is thin and will hold only modest lift either way.
- AssemblingWarm jam spreads more evenly over a cake this fragile. Loosen each round with a palette knife and turn one out browned-side down so the pair meet cleanly.
- YieldTwo 8-inch rounds sandwiched together cut into six to eight wedges. Best eaten the day it is baked; the recipe notes it may be had hot or cold.
The Victorian "sandwich" in baking meant any cake split or paired and filled — the Victoria sandwich being the famous survivor — and jam was among the commonest fillings. This particular version belongs to a family of egg-and-cream batters closer to a baked custard than to a creamed sponge, a style found in nineteenth-century household books. Ground rice appears often in such recipes: it absorbs liquid without developing gluten, giving a short, tender set that plain flour alone would not. The note that it may be eaten hot or cold suggests a nursery and tea-table dish rather than a formal one.