Home › Our Susan's Opinion of a Kitchen › Suggestions

Suggestions

-HOOD.

Iu making Cake, it is very desirable that the materials be of the finest quality. Sweet, fresh butter, eggs and good flour are the first essentials. The process of putting together is also quite an important feature, and where other methods are not given in this work by contributors, it would be well for the young housekeeper to observe the following direction: Never allow the butter to oil, but soften it by putting it in a moderately warm place before you commence other preparations for your cake; then put it into an earthen dish (tin, if not new, will discolour your cake as you stir it), and add your sugar; beat the butter and sugar to a cream; add the yolks of the eggs, then the milk, and lastly the beaten whites of the eggs and flour. Spices and liquors may be added after the yolks of the eggs are put in, and fruit should be put in with the flour.

The oven should be pretty hot for small cakes, and moderate for larger. To ascertain if a large cake is sufficiently baked, pierce it with a broom-straw through the centre; if done, the straw will come out free from dough; if not done, dough will adhere to the straw. Take it out of the tin about fifteen minutes after it is taken from the oven (not sooner), and do not turn it over on the top to cool.