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Maple Biscuit
To the well-beaten yolks of twelve eggs, add half pound of powdered or granulated sugar and half a cup of sweet milk; mix one tea -spoon baking-powder in a (scant) half pound of sifted flour, then sift the flour gently into the batter and add flavoring, bake in biscuit pans, spreading the batter one and a half to two inches thick in the pan. If rightly made it will be very light. Do not bake too fast, and have the oven about as for sponge cake. When cold, cut into slices three inches long and one inch wide. Ice the sides, ends and top with white, pink and chocolate icing. Dry in oven, and then, if desired, the bottom may be iced. Build in square blocks and place on table. Serve a plate of the white, one of the pink, and one of the brown, or they may be mixed in building. - Mrs. J. S. Sperry, Nashville, Tenn.
This is a sponge cake in the older sense of biscuit — a yolk-rich batter baked in a sheet, cut into fingers and iced on all sides for the tea table. The hinge is the egg foam: twelve yolks beaten to a thick, pale ribbon are most of the lift, and the flour must be folded in without knocking the air out.
- Oven temperatureThe recipe gives no figure: "about as for sponge cake" and "do not bake too fast" point to a moderate oven, in modern terms somewhere around 325-350F. Time will depend on the pan; judge by the centre springing back and a skewer coming out clean rather than by the clock.
- Half pound of sugar, scant half pound of flourEight ounces of granulated sugar is about 1 1/8 cups. Half a pound of sifted flour is about 2 cups, so a "scant" half pound is a little under that — sifted flour weighs less per cup than scooped, so weigh it if you can.
- Sweet milkSimply fresh unsoured milk, as opposed to the sour milk or buttermilk used with saleratus elsewhere in the book. Whole milk is the closest match.
- The flavoringThe original leaves it unnamed, as period recipes often do. Given the title, maple extract is the obvious reading; a teaspoon of extract, or vanilla if you prefer, suits this quantity of batter.
- Biscuit pansShallow rectangular baking pans, not a modern biscuit tray. A small square pan lined with parchment makes the cold cake easy to lift out for cutting; use the smallest that will hold the batter if you want the 1 1/2 to 2 inch depth the recipe asks for.
- Beating the yolksBeat the yolks with the sugar until thick and light — five minutes or more with a mixer. The baking powder is insurance only, and cannot rescue an underbeaten foam.
- Icing on all sidesUse a stiff water or royal icing so it sets rather than sags on the cut ends. "Dry in oven" means the lowest setting with the door ajar, or simply an hour at room temperature; the aim is a firm shell, not more baking.
- Yield and the leftover whitesA 9-inch square cut into fingers of the stated size gives somewhere around two dozen and a half. Twelve whites are left over — meringue, an angel cake, or icing for this same recipe.
"Biscuit" here is the French sense — a light yolk-and-sugar sponge, the same family as savoiardi and the base of petits fours — rather than the Southern breakfast biscuit that fills other pages of this book. Cutting a sheet of sponge into fingers, icing them in white, pink and chocolate, and stacking them in blocks on the table is often said to have been familiar Victorian tea-table work, where confectionery was arranged for display as much as for eating. The maple appears only in the title — the recipe itself never mentions it — and the dish's arrival by way of a named contributor, Mrs. J. S. Sperry of Nashville, reflects the credited contributions that were added to The Dixie Cook-Book, a compilation that also drew heavily on earlier material.