The Kitchen

Here, Madam, is the way to make two cakes: the first small and simple, while the second is called the canned-fruit cake; it is more like a dessert and is served after the meal.

The First Cake

Ingredients (enough for two persons):

Two cups of flour — 3 spoons of baking powder — a spoon of leavening salt — 3 tablespoons of sugar — two eggs — one and three-quarters cups of milk — a quarter cup of butter.

As for the method, it is very easy:

First — Sift the flour and mix it with the baking powder, the salt, and the sugar. Then beat the eggs well in a medium-sized bowl.

Second — Add the flour and stir the mixture with a tablespoon until all the flour is moistened. Then add the melted butter and stir with a spoon; do not beat it, for the solid lumps will melt during baking.

Third — Make sure the baking griddles are hot enough: they must be so hot that if a drop of water is placed on them, it scatters to the sides before it evaporates. Do not grease the griddles with butter. When pouring out the pieces, use a tablespoon and pour from it onto the hot griddle. After you bake the cakes, turn them over so that both faces brown to one color. You may vary this recipe according to your taste: substitute cornmeal for half the flour, or add grated apple to a spoonful of sugar and put them on top of the butter. When the baking is finished you may serve the cakes on a plate with syrup, or honey, or sweetened apple juice poured over them.

And here is the canned-fruit cake:

Ingredients: Two cups of flour — a quarter spoon of salt — a third of a cup of butter — a quarter of a cup of light cream — the yolk of one egg.

And this is the way to make the cake:

First: Sift the flour and take from it the required amount, then add the salt to it and put it in a medium-sized bowl, where you work in the butter and blend it with a knife, cutting it into the flour until its grains are the size of a grain of wheat. Then add the cream, after you have beaten it with the egg yolk; then blend the dough with a fork until it holds together well, and keep it in stiff paper until the time of its use. When the dough is cut into small pieces, each one is placed in its own baking dish; press the dough with your hand or with the help of a fork, so that it takes the shape of the dish in which you want to place it for baking. After you bake the cakes, in their own dishes, in the oven for a quarter of an hour, until they brown, their shape will be like a hollowed-out dish, so that you can fill it with the fruit and the syrup. And this is the way to make this fruit syrup:

Ingredients: a cup of sweetened fruit juice — a third of a cup of sugar — a little salt — two spoons of cold water — a spoon and a half of starch — a little grated lemon peel — two spoons of lemon juice — half a spoon of butter.

As for the way to make this syrup, it is as follows:

First: Mix the fruit juice with the sugar and the salt in a medium-sized pan and boil them over a moderate fire. Then add the water to the starch and blend them until the starch dissolves. Add the starch slowly to the juice boiling on the fire, stirring it meanwhile

with a spoon. After it has boiled for two minutes and become dissolved and clear, take it off the heat and add the butter, the lemon juice, and the grated peel. Let it cool for five minutes. Then add this mixture by the spoonful to the cakes while they are in their baking dishes, after you have filled each cake with a piece of the canned fruit — apricots, for example. Let the cooked juice fill every empty space in the cake.

Let the cakes with their fruit cool at ordinary temperature until serving time.

Vanilla Cake

Half a cup of butter
A cup of sugar
Five eggs
Two cups of flour
Two teaspoons of baking powder
One teaspoon of ammonium carbonate.
Half a cup of milk and one teaspoon of vanilla essence.

Beat the butter until it whitens, then add two-thirds of the sugar gradually to the butter and beat well. Beat the eggs with the whisk until stiff, add the rest of the sugar to them, and go on beating until the sugar dissolves.

Now add the eggs and sugar to the butter and sugar and stir with a wooden spoon until they are blended together; then gradually fold in the flour, mixed and sifted with the baking powder and the ammonium carbonate, alternating with the milk and the essence. After that grease the pan with a little butter and sprinkle it with a little flour, then turn it over and shake it to remove the excess flour; pour the mixture into it and bake it. After baking, spread the face of the cake with a little jam, blended and beaten with a quarter teaspoon of vanilla essence or with a drop of banana essence; then sprinkle over the face of the cake some pounded walnuts or toasted, pounded almonds.

Blossoming Spring Cakes

A cup of butter and Vegetaline
A cup and a half of sugar

One tablespoon of cognac
Six eggs
Two cups of flour
Five teaspoons of baking powder
A cup of lemon juice
A cup of milk, or half a cup of yogurt mixed with half a teaspoon of soda.
One teaspoon of lemon spirit or essence.

Beat the butter and the Vegetaline, then add half the amount of sugar and the cognac and beat well... Beat the eggs well, then add to them the rest of the sugar and beat. After that mix the two parts of the mixture together well, then gradually and carefully fold in the flour, mixed and sifted with the baking powder, alternating with a little of the lemon juice and the milk, until the milk and the flour are used up; finally add the syrup, then pour half the mixture into a pan or a tray and bake it.

As for the other half, add to it a tablespoon of cocoa and bake it in another pan.

After baking, let the cakes cool, then cut them with a drinking glass into small round pieces; put a filling between each piece of the white cake and the brown cake, make of them a single cake, and decorate it with the cream.

The cream: a cup of milk or milk cream.
Four tablespoons of sugar
Two eggs, well beaten
One and a half tablespoons of cornstarch (corn flour).

Add the sugar, mixed with the starch, to the milk gradually, stirring; then add the eggs, and after that put the mixture on the fire and cook it, stirring constantly until it thickens; then take it off the fire and let it cool completely, then beat it by itself. After that beat half a cup of butter, add the cooked mixture gradually to the butter, and beat well until the mixture grows smooth and whitens. Fill and coat the cakes; then add two drops of lemon essence and two drops of lemon coloring to one part of it, and to the other part add two drops of orange coloring, and decorate the cakes with the decorating tube.