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Cake (Compressed yeast cup milk)
1 cake compressed yeast 1/2 cup milk, scalded and cooled 1 tablespoon sugar 2 cups sifted flour 1/2 cup light brown sugar 2 level tablespoons butter 1 egg 1/4 teaspoon salt Dissolve the yeast and one tablespoon of sugar in the lukewarm milk. Add three fourths cup of flour, to make a sponge. Beat well; cover and let rise forty-five minutes in a moderately warm place. Add butter and sugar creamed, egg well beaten, about one and one fourth cups of flour, or sufficient to make a soft dough, and the salt. Knead lightly; place in greased bowl; cover and let rise in a warm place about two hours, or until double in bulk. Roll one half inch thick; place in well-greased pan and let rise until light. Cut across top with sharp knife; brush with egg; sprinkle liberally with sugar and cinnamon. Bake twenty minutes in a moderately hot oven.
A sweet yeast coffee cake, filed under Frozen Desserts by an error of the loose-leaf format rather than any intent. The method is sound and translates directly; only the yeast and the oven need restating.
- Compressed yeastA cake of compressed (fresh) yeast of this era was about 0.6 oz. Substitute one 1/4-oz packet of active dry or instant yeast, roughly 2 1/4 teaspoons.
- Scalded and cooled milkScalding was said to destroy something in raw milk that slackened dough; pasteurized milk does not need it. Warm the milk to about 105F and proceed. Milk much above 115F risks damaging the yeast.
- "A moderately hot oven"375 to 400F. Twenty minutes is right for a cake rolled half an inch thick; it should read about 190F internally and sound hollow.
- "Moderately warm place"Around 75 to 80F. A modern kitchen may well be cooler than a kitchen with a range going, so the two-hour bulk rise may run longer. Judge by doubling, not by the clock.
- The sponge stageThe first rise with only flour, milk, yeast and sugar builds flavor and gives the yeast a head start before the butter, egg and heavier sugar go in. Do not skip it and dump everything together; enriched dough rises sluggishly without it.
- Flour quantityTwo cups sifted is a guide, not a rule. Sifted flour weighs about 4 oz per cup, so this is roughly 8 oz total. Add the second addition gradually and stop at a soft, slightly tacky dough.
- Cutting and glazingThe slashes across the top presumably let the cake expand without tearing. Brush with the beaten egg, then the cinnamon sugar, immediately before it goes in the oven.
- Pan and yieldThe quantity would suit something like an 8- or 9-inch square or round pan, serving perhaps six to eight. Best the day it is baked.
This resembles the standard American coffee cake of its period: a yeast dough enriched with a little butter, egg and brown sugar, rolled flat, slashed and finished with cinnamon sugar. Cakes of this kind are generally associated with the German and Central European Kuchen tradition carried by nineteenth-century immigration, and sweetened yeast doughs are well represented in Midwestern and Pennsylvania baking. Compressed yeast, sold in wrapped cakes and needing to be kept cold, was widely used in households from the later nineteenth century; active dry yeast appeared in the 1940s but took some time to displace it, which is why books of this period measure yeast by the cake. Why the page sits under "Frozen Desserts" is unclear.