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Doris B's Blitz Torte
1/2 cup shortening 1/2 cup sugar 4 egg yolks 2 tablespoons milk 1/2 cup flour 1 teaspoon baking powder 1 teaspoon vanilla 4 egg whites, beaten stiff 1 cup sugar 1/4 cup almonds (chopped) Cream shortening and sugar, add yolks of eggs and beat until light and lemon colored. Add milk, flour, baking powder and vanilla and beat well. Spread the cake in two 8 inch pans. It will be very thin. Over cake dough, spread meringue of stiffly beaten egg whites with 1 cup of sugar and almonds, which have been chopped. Bake in a moderate oven (350 degrees F) for 45 minutes. Serves six.
A two-in-one bake: thin butter-cake layers with meringue spread over the raw batter, so cake and topping set together. A few points make the difference between a crisp meringue and a weeping one.
- The hingeThe meringue goes onto unbaked batter and bakes with it. Spread the batter to the pan edges first, then spoon meringue over it and level gently so the layer underneath is not dragged or torn.
- Sugar into the whitesOne cup of sugar to four whites is a firm, glossy meringue, but it must go in a tablespoon at a time after the whites hold soft peaks. Dumping it in at once gives a slack foam that beads syrup during baking.
- Oven350F is correct as written. Set the pans on the middle rack; if the meringue is browning hard before 30 minutes, drop to 325F rather than tenting, which traps steam and softens the crust.
- Shortening"Shortening" here most likely means hydrogenated vegetable shortening, though the word could still cover butter or lard. Unsalted butter works and tastes better; a pinch of salt, which the original omits, is worth adding to taste.
- That half cup of flourIt is deliberately small. The layers bake to roughly a quarter inch and act more like a base for the meringue than a cake. Grease the pans well and line the bottoms with parchment, as there is little structure to unmould.
- AlmondsChopped fine rather than slivered. The recipe folds them into the meringue along with the sugar; if you would rather keep the foam at full volume, scatter them over the spread meringue instead.
- Cooling and assemblyCool in the pans until the meringue is firm, about 20 minutes, then release carefully; the crust cracks if handled warm. The recipe gives no filling, and the traditional treatment is a layer of sweetened whipped cream or a thin vanilla custard between the two rounds, meringue sides up.
- YieldSix as written is generous slicing of an 8-inch torte; eight portions is more usual today. Assemble no more than an hour or two before serving, as the meringue softens where it meets cream.