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Chocolate Cake II
1/2 cup butter. 1 1/2 cups sugar. 1/2 cup milk. 2 1/4 cups flour. 1/4 teaspoon soda ¾ teaspoon cream of tartar Whites 5 eggs 2 squares unsweetened chocolate, grated Cream the butter; add sugar gradually, milk, and flour mixed and sifted with soda and cream of tartar. Beat whites and sifted with soda and cream of tartar. Beat whites of eggs, and add to first mixture; then add chocolate, and beat thoroughly. Bake forty-five minutes in a moderate oven.
A white-batter chocolate cake from the Farmer school: egg whites only, chemical leavening mixed by hand, and grated chocolate stirred in at the end. A few of its conventions need translating.
- "Moderate oven"350F. Forty-five minutes suits a single deep layer or a loaf pan; two shallow layers will be done in 25 to 30 minutes. Test with a skewer at the centre rather than trusting the clock.
- Soda and cream of tartarThis pair acts as a homemade baking powder. The proportion usually given in period books is one part soda to two of cream of tartar; the ratio here, 1/4 teaspoon to 3/4 teaspoon, is nearer one to three. The mixture begins reacting as soon as liquid is added, so get the cake into the oven promptly.
- Squares of chocolateAn unsweetened baking square is one ounce, so two squares is two ounces. Melted and cooled chocolate gives a smoother crumb and colours the batter more evenly than grated.
- The egg whitesFive whites add lift alongside the soda and cream of tartar. Fold them in with a light hand and stop as soon as no streaks remain -- the instruction to "beat thoroughly" after adding the chocolate will knock out air if taken literally.
- Butter, sugar, milk and flourThe quantities for these are not given in the text as printed here. A cake of this type and period would run to roughly 1/2 cup butter, 1 1/2 cups sugar, 1/2 cup milk and 2 cups flour; treat that as a reconstruction, not the author's figure.
- YieldOn the reconstructed quantities above, the batter would fill one 9-inch tube or square pan, or two 8-inch layers, and serve eight to ten. Butter and flour the pan or line it with paper.
This one belongs to the white-cake family, using only the whites of the eggs, a common style of the period; the yolks would keep for a custard, a sauce or a gold cake. The soda and cream of tartar are measured separately here, rather than called for as a spoonful of baking powder.