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Golden Cake
1/4 cup butter 1/2 cup sugar Yolks 5 eggs 1/4 cup milk 7/8 cup flour 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder 1 teaspoon orange extract Cream the butter, add sugar gradually, and yolks of eggs beaten until thick and lemon-colored, and extract. Mix and sift flour and baking powder, and add alternately with milk to first mixture. Omit orange extract, add one-half cup nut meat cut in small pieces, and bake in individual tins.
A small yolk-rich butter cake of the creaming-method type, sized for a single layer or a dozen small tins. The batter is stiff and the quantities are odd by modern eyes, so measure carefully.
- The 7/8 cup of flourThat is one cup less two tablespoons, roughly 110 g of unsifted all-purpose flour. Sift after measuring, as the original directs, or the batter will be heavy against so little liquid.
- Five yolks, no whitesYolk cakes of this kind were often made alongside a white or silver cake that used the whites, though this recipe says nothing of it. Beat the yolks until genuinely thick and pale, three to four minutes with a mixer; the aeration works with the baking powder to lift the batter.
- Oven heatNo temperature is given in the recipe. Bake at 350F. A single 8-inch layer takes about 25 minutes, small tins 15 to 18.
- Alternating dry and wetWith only a quarter cup of milk to three-quarters cup of butter and sugar, add the flour in three additions and the milk in two, beginning and ending with flour. Stop mixing the moment the last flour disappears.
- Baking powderPeriod baking powders varied in strength and formulation. Modern double-acting powder at 1 1/2 teaspoons is ample; do not increase it.
- Orange extractA teaspoon of modern extract is strong; the zest of one orange gives a cleaner flavour if you prefer.
- The nut variationThe closing sentence describes a second cake, not a further step for the first: leave out the orange extract, fold in half a cup of chopped nuts, and bake in individual tins.
- YieldNo yield is given; the quantities suggest roughly one small single layer, or about a dozen of the individual tins called for in the variation.