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Slappers
"Slappers" or "slap-jacks" are the old-fashioned Indian cakes baked on a griddle. To make them, put in a bowl the night before 1 pint I2I of soft corn-meal, 1 teaspoonful of salt and 1 tablespoonful of butter. Pour over just enough boiling water from the kettle to moisten, stirring until every grain of the meal is wet, but not sloppy. Cover closely and let stand near the fire over night. In the morning add 3 wellbeaten eggs, 1 cupful of sifted flour, 2 scant teaspoonfuls of baking-powder and enough cold milk to mix all to a very thick batter. Put by spoonfuls on a moderately hot greased griddle and when browned turn and brown on the other side. They will take about ten minutes to cook through.
A scalded-cornmeal griddle cake left to soften overnight, then lightened with egg and baking powder in the morning. The overnight rest is the whole point: it hydrates the meal so the cakes are tender rather than gritty.
- The numeralsThroughout, the figure printed as a capital I is the numeral 1. Read it as 1 pint of cornmeal, 1 teaspoon of salt, 1 tablespoon of butter, 1 cup of sifted flour.
- Indian meal"Indian cakes" and "soft corn-meal" both mean cornmeal. "Soft" meal is usually taken to mean a finely ground white or yellow meal rather than coarse grits or polenta; a fine stone-ground meal is a reasonable modern match.
- The overnight soakScald the meal with just enough boiling water to wet every grain, stopping well short of sloppy; the recipe gives no measure on purpose. Then cover. "Near the fire" meant a warm hearthside; a countertop is fine overnight, but refrigerate if your kitchen is above about 75F, and let it come back to room temperature before mixing.
- Batter consistencyAfter the eggs, flour and baking powder go in, add cold milk a little at a time. The soaked meal varies a great deal in how much it has absorbed, so start with about half a cup and stop when the batter mounds thickly on the spoon.
- Griddle heat"Moderately hot" is conventionally read as somewhere around 350-375F on an electric griddle, or a heavy pan where a drop of water skitters rather than vanishes instantly; the book itself gives no figure. Hotter than that and the outside sets long before the thick cake cooks through.
- Ten minutes is rightUnlike a thin pancake, these are spooned thick and genuinely need something near ten minutes total. Judge by a dry centre when pressed, not by colour alone.
- YieldThe recipe gives no yield. A pint of meal with a cup of flour, three eggs and milk makes a large batch of thick spooned cakes, enough for a family breakfast. They are best straight from the griddle, with butter and molasses or syrup.
Slapjack, slap-jack and flapjack were all in circulation in nineteenth-century American kitchens for a cake dropped or slapped onto a griddle, and "Indian cake" marked it as made from cornmeal rather than wheat -- "Indian" being the standard American term for maize meal from the colonial period well into the twentieth century. The overnight scald and rest looks like the older element of the method, a way of softening home-ground meal without a long cooking, while the eggs, wheat flour and baking powder added in the morning are consistent with the chemical leavening that became common in ordinary households in the second half of the 1800s, though leavening alone can only loosely suggest a date. Cornmeal was also markedly cheaper than wheat flour, and a pint of it stretched by one cup of flour and three eggs feeds a family a hot breakfast for very little.