Holmcroft Cake

This is an ingredient list rather than a method, in the shorthand a nineteenth-century cook could fill in from habit. Two things need settling before you start: the cup sizes and the missing leavening.

• Coffee-cup and teacupThese were not standardised units, but a coffee-cup is generally read as something close to a full cup, about 8 fl oz, and a teacup as smaller, commonly reckoned anywhere from a half to three-quarters of a cup. On the three-quarter reading the proportions come out at roughly 1 cup sugar, 2 cups flour, 3/4 cup milk.
• No leavening is listedAs written the batter has no baking powder or soda, and two tablespoons of butter creamed with sugar will not aerate two cups of flour. Whether a leavening line was omitted, or self-rising flour was assumed, or the whites were meant to be beaten stiff, the receipt does not say; a modern baker would need to add a leavening of roughly a teaspoon per cup of flour.
• "Sweet milk"Ordinary fresh whole milk, named to distinguish it from the buttermilk or clabbered milk that would have called for soda instead.
• Butter not meltedThe instruction matters more than it looks. The butter is meant to be soft enough to cream with the sugar so it holds air; melted butter gives a denser, closer crumb.
• Whites or a whole eggTwo whites give a paler, lighter cake in the "silver cake" manner; one whole egg gives more colour and richness. Either way this is a lean batter by modern standards, closer to a plain tea cake than a birthday layer.
• Oven and panThe receipt says nothing about oven, pan or time. For a plain cake of this size a modern reconstruction would use a moderate oven, around 350F, in a single 8-inch round or square pan, roughly 25 to 30 minutes until a tester comes out clean.
• YieldAbout one modest 8-inch layer, eight small servings. It is best the day it is baked and takes well to a simple boiled icing or nothing at all.