The Library of Work and Play: HousekeepingGilman, Elizabeth Hale
General
The Library of Work and Play: Housekeeping
Gilman, Elizabeth Hale
Home economics
_Cake._--There are other methods of making food "light" besides putting
yeast into it. Two of these are commonly used in making cake and fancy
breads. Sponge cakes are made light by beating air into the eggs used.
Cakes which contain butter, and breads which contain no yeast are made
light with baking powder, which is a mixture of soda and cream of
tartar, or with soda and cream of tartar put in separately. Soda is an
alkali; cream of tarter is an acid. A combination of the two liberates
carbonic acid gas to raise the cake and also counteracts the poisonous
properties of the soda. Three rounded teaspoonfuls of baking powder
produce the same effect as one level teaspoonful of soda and two
rounded teaspoonfuls of cream of tartar. Therefore, if a receipt calls
for soda and cream of tartar and we have only baking powder, or vice
versa, we may use one for the other if we remember this equality.
One frequently finds soda and not cream of tartar called for in
receipts in which sour milk or molasses is required. In such cases the
acid in the milk or in the molasses will take the place of that usually
furnished by cream of tartar. Soda and cream of tartar, or baking
powder, should be put into the flour before it is sifted, they are thus
thoroughly mixed with it and also sifted.
The ingredients of fancy breads and cake must be mixed in ways which
will not interfere with the means by which they are made light.
It is usually a good plan when mixing muffins, gems, Sally Lunn or
anything of the kind which does not require kneading, to put all the
dry ingredients together in one bowl, all the wet ones together in
another bowl, then to stir the wet ones into the dry ones and if there
are eggs in the mixture fold in the beaten whites last.
Whites of eggs are nearly always the last thing to be put into any
mixture, because if they are moved about more than is necessary to get
them in, much of the air in them will be lost.
The ingredients of cake are usually mixed in the following order:
butter and sugar beaten together to a creamy consistency; beaten yolks
of eggs; milk or water and flavouring; flour and baking powder; whites
of eggs.
The order for mixing a sponge cake is the same except that some of the
ingredients mentioned in this list will be omitted.
The reason that flour is put in last, or next to the last, is that it
contains the baking powder or the soda and cream of tartar. When these
substances are wet they give off gas which is to make the cake light,
therefore they should not be wet until just before the cake is ready
for the oven.
Fruit is put into a cake last of all. It is floured before it is put
in to keep the pieces from sticking together, and to keep the moisture
they contain from injuring the cake.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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