Spice Cake
2 cups sugar 1 cup molasses 1 1/2 cups butter 1 cup sour milk 2 tablespoons cinnamon 1 tablespoon cloves 5 eggs 2 nutmegs 1 lb. raisins 5 cups Gold Medal flour 1 large teaspoon soda 1/2 lb. currants, (1/2 lb. citron, if wanted rich)
This is a list of ingredients with no method at all, which was normal for cake pages in flour-company booklets — the reader was assumed to know how a butter cake goes together. It is also a very large, heavily spiced fruit cake, closer to a keeping cake than a snack cake.
- Scale and pansThe batter is very large, running to something over six pounds with the citron. It fills a 10-inch tube pan plus a loaf, or three standard 9x5 loaf pans; a single pan will overflow. Line the pans with parchment, since the sugar and molasses catch easily.
- Assembly, since none is givenCream the butter and sugar, beat in the eggs, then add the molasses. Dissolve the soda in the sour milk and add it alternately with the flour and spices. Toss the raisins, currants and citron with a few spoonfuls of the measured flour before folding them in, so the fruit stays suspended.
- OvenA cake this dense wants 325F, not the 350F you would give a plain layer cake — 1 1/2 to 2 hours for loaves, longer for a tube pan. Tent with foil once the top has set. It is done when a skewer comes out clean of batter, ignoring smears from the fruit.
- Sour milk and sodaSour milk here means naturally soured raw milk; buttermilk is the direct substitute, or a cup of whole milk with a tablespoon of vinegar or lemon juice left to stand. "1 large teaspoon soda" means a generously heaped one — read it as about 1 1/2 teaspoons. The acid in the milk and the molasses together is what it is neutralising.
- Two nutmegsWhole nutmegs, grated, not two of anything pre-ground. Two average nutmegs yield roughly 4 to 6 teaspoons, which with 2 tablespoons cinnamon and 1 tablespoon cloves makes an aggressively spiced cake by current taste. Halving the cloves and nutmeg gives something closer to modern expectations.
- Butter1 1/2 cups is three sticks, 12 ounces. Period butter was often sold salted and quite moist; use unsalted and add 1/2 teaspoon salt, which the original omits entirely.
- CitronCandied citron peel, sold at holiday time or from baking suppliers. If you cannot find it, candied orange peel is the nearest thing in function; the "if wanted rich" tells you it was the optional luxury.
- KeepingWrapped well, this improves over several days as the spice and fruit settle. It slices cleanly only after it is fully cold.
Flour-milling companies gave away cook books like this one to put their brand name into the recipe itself — note that the ingredient list does not say "flour" but "Gold Medal flour," a small piece of advertising embedded in the instructions. The cake belongs to the old American family of dark, molasses-sweetened spice cakes that shade into fruit cake at the rich end; the spices, dried fruit and citron were pantry goods bought in quantity. Sour milk as a leavening partner for soda points to a household still handling raw milk, where a jug that had turned was a resource rather than a loss. The near-total absence of method is characteristic of the period: a recipe listed what went into a cake, and everyone knew what to do with it.