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Joe's Cake
Fannie S.
Two cups of sugar, one-half cup butter, two eggs, half a cup of raisins chopped fine, half a cup of currants, a little lemon peel, one teaspoonful of essence of lemons, one-half cup of milk, two teaspoonsful of Cook's Friend baking powder, and three cups of flour.
This is an ingredient list in the shorthand of a community cookbook, where the contributor assumed every reader knew how to mix a cake. The proportions are sound; only the method and the oven are missing.
- Method, since none is givenCream the butter and sugar, beat in the eggs, then add the milk alternately with the flour sifted with the baking powder, and fold in the fruit and flavouring last. Toss the chopped raisins and currants in a spoonful of the measured flour so they do not sink.
- OvenNo temperature is given because the book predates oven thermostats. Bake at 350F, about 45-55 minutes in a loaf pan or 30-35 in two 8-inch layers, until a skewer comes out clean.
- Cook's Friend baking powderA Canadian brand of the period. Any modern double-acting baking powder substitutes measure for measure.
- The leavening is light by modern standardsTwo teaspoons for three cups of flour is less than current practice, which runs closer to one teaspoon per cup. Nineteenth-century powders were sold in varying strengths; three teaspoons will give a more familiar rise.
- Essence of lemonsThis is lemon extract. One teaspoon of extract plus the grated zest called for as "a little lemon peel" — roughly the zest of half a lemon — covers both flavourings.
- CurrantsDried Zante currants, the small black raisin, not fresh red or black currants. If they are hard, cover with hot water for ten minutes and drain well.
- Expect a stiff batterTwo cups of sugar against half a cup of butter and half a cup of milk makes a dense, close-grained cake rather than a fluffy one. A little more milk, a tablespoon at a time, brings it to a dropping consistency without changing the character of the cake.
- YieldAbout one 9x5-inch loaf, or two thin 8-inch layers; twelve to sixteen slices.
The Home Cook Book was compiled in Toronto in the 1870s by "ladies of Toronto and chief cities and towns in Canada," sold to raise money for the Hospital for Sick Children, and drew on both local signed contributions like this one from Fannie S. and earlier printed compilations. Cakes named for a person — Joe's Cake, Aunt Mary's Cake, Mrs. Brown's Loaf — are often said to be a signature form of these subscription books: the name is generally taken to record who liked it or who gave it, not any quality of the cake itself, and the recipe travelled by name from kitchen to kitchen. The bare ingredient list with no method is equally characteristic. So is the brand name in the middle of it. Chemical baking powders were still new enough in the 1870s to be worth naming.