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Sweet Milk Griddle-cakes
3 cups flour 1 1/2 tablespoons baking powder 1 teaspoon salt 1/4 cup sugar 2 cups milk 1 egg 2 tablespoons melted butter Mix and sift dry ingredients; beat egg, add milk, and pour slowly on first mixture. Beat thoroughly, and add butter. Cook same as Sour Milk Griddle-cakes. Begin cooking cakes at once or more baking powder will be required.
A plain baking-powder pancake batter with no surprises, though the sugar is higher than most modern versions and the final line carries the real instruction.
- Cook it immediatelyThe closing note is the hinge: baking powder begins releasing gas the moment the milk hits the flour, and a batter left to stand will rise less well, markedly so with the single-acting powders of the period. Have the griddle hot before you combine wet and dry.
- Griddle heatThe recipe gives no temperature, only a cross-reference to Sour Milk Griddle-cakes. A lightly greased griddle at about 375F, or medium on a modern burner, suits cakes of this kind; a drop of water should skitter rather than sit and steam.
- Baking powderFour and a half teaspoons for three cups of flour is generous by current practice; period powders were mostly single-acting and weaker. Three to four teaspoons is nearer the modern norm, and the full amount can leave a faintly bitter edge.
- FlourAll-purpose works; measure by spooning into the cup and levelling rather than scooping, or the batter will be too stiff.
- MixingThe recipe says "beat thoroughly." With modern all-purpose, stir only until the dry streaks disappear -- a few lumps are preferable to a tough cake.
- Butter lastAdding the melted butter after the batter is mixed keeps it from seizing into flecks against cold milk.
- YieldAbout sixteen to eighteen four-inch cakes, serving four generously. Sour milk or buttermilk cannot simply be swapped in here without changing the leavening.