“I am having only half the recipe made, so the cake is not very large; but we are such small cake-eaters that we get tired of a large one. Another time, if you make this cake, you may put rose-water or peach-water instead of the wine, and chopped candied lemon-peel instead of the grated peel. You see the batter is much thicker than for the cup cake you made, but if at any time you use flour that absorbs more moisture, you must add another egg; this is, as it should be, as thick as pound-cake batter,—which means, as thick as can be stirred. It is more a paste than a batter. Will you remember that, when you have a recipe which says ‘thick as pound-cake batter’? Any cake with baking-powder made as thick as this would be spoiled. It would be tough, with great holes here and there, so you must be very careful not to confuse the two rules,—_moderately thick_ batter for plain cakes, with milk and baking-powder; very thick batter for the richer ones, made without. Yet, of course, they must be stirred with a spoon; if too stiff for that, your flour is very absorbent, and you need another egg. Remember there is _never_ any harm in adding an egg; it will never spoil your cake as too much milk would do. “All cakes without baking-powder or its equivalents, soda and cream of tartar, require a much slower oven than those with them. A slow oven ruins a plain cake, a quick one spoils a rich cake, and you must be especially careful to turn it very gently, and, in taking this or _any_ cake with much butter in it from the oven, to put it on the table very gently. I have known a cake to come from the oven perfect, yet, from being dropped hastily on the table, to collapse with a puff of steam issuing from it. The same thing may happen from taking it from the pan while quite hot, or from its not being quite cooked through; cakes require to ‘soak’ a few minutes even after a broom straw comes out clean. Lack of knowledge on these small points is one of the reasons why many people who make excellent plain cakes—by which I mean all the variety of cakes with baking-powder and little butter—do not succeed with richer ones, and why so many look upon pound cake as so very difficult, while it is really as easy as any other.” Marta had twice succeeded admirably with the cup cake, which her unfortunate bang of the oven door had spoiled the first time. Instead of frying the _filet de sole_ for dinner, Molly intended to have what is called by cooks _turbans of sole_, with béchamel. She put the bones and fins left from boning a flounder (see directions, Chapter XIX.) into a pint of water, and let them stew slowly at the back of the range; then she rolled up the filets and fastened each with a wooden toothpick, and set them to keep cool until she was ready to cook them.