Collection of Cakes

How awesome is it that one (economical) cake recipe can do so many things?  In a previous post, I made Creole Cake (Recipe is here.  It's the same cake baked in a square pan and topped with chocolate/coffee frosting.), three weeks ago I made Layer Cake with Pink Frosting (see below) and yesterday I made Boston Cream Pie.  Unfortunately, I only made half of a Boston Cream Pie, because my layers stuck to their pans and I was only able to salvage one of them.  No worries, though--we'll cover the other in custard and lots of sherry, call it a trifle and everything will be all right.  You wouldn't even know except that I just told you.  Besides, I don't believe in pretending that everything always turns out exactly as I intend!


One Egg Cake:

 Serves 12

1/4 cup butter (4 tablespoons)

1 cup sugar

1 egg

1 1/2 cups cake flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup milk

1 teaspoon vanilla

• Either preheat oven to 350 degrees and grease an 8" square cake tin or preheat oven to 375 degrees and grease two 8" round cake tins.
• In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and sugar.
• Beat in egg, then vanilla, combining thoroughly.
• Beat in flour (1/2 cup at a time) and milk (1/4 cup at a time) alternately, beating after each addition.  With the last 1/2 cup of flour, add the salt and baking powder.
• If making a square cake, pour batter into tin, smooth out with a spatula and bake 45 to 50 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean.
• If making two round layers, divide batter evenly between tins, smooth out with a spatula and bake 20 to 25 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean.
• Leave cake tin(s) to cool on a rack 10 minutes, then turn out and leave to cool completely.   

Adapted from "Calumet One-egg Cake," All About Home Baking (New York: General Foods Corporation, 1933), 32.

Layer Cake with Pink Frosting

Serves 12

Bake One Egg Cake in two 8"-round cake tins (375 degrees, 20-25 minutes).  Cool completely and set aside.

Frosting:
1/4 cup butter
2 cups powdered sugar, sifted
gel food coloring (optional, can be any color but I used pink)
approximately 3 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
dash of salt (less than a pinch)

• In a medium mixing bowl, cream butter.  Add sugar gradually, beating after each addition.
• If you are using food coloring, beat it into the frosting now.
• Beat in milk, a little at a time, until frosting is a good consistency for spreading (you may not need all the milk).
• Stir in vanilla and salt.
• Frost the top of the first layer and place the second layer on top of it.  Frost the top of the second layer, as well.

Adapted from "Butter Frosting," All About Home Baking (New York: General Foods Corporation, 1933,), 107.

Boston Cream Pie

Serves 12

Bake One Egg Cake in two 8"-round cake tins (375 degrees, 20-25 minutes).  Cool completely and set aside.

Custard Filling:
3 tablespoons cake flour
1/3 cup sugar
Dash of salt
1 cup milk
1 egg yolk
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

• Put all the ingredients, except vanilla, in the top of a double boiler.
• Whisk continuously over high heat for about 10 minutes, or until mixture has thickened.
• Cool slightly then stir in vanilla.
• Cover with plastic wrap (directly on the custard to prevent a skin from forming) and chill until needed.  Custard should be completely cooled before using.

Chocolate icing:
3 tablespoons chocolate chips
1 teaspoon butter
2 tablespoons hot water
3/4 cup powdered sugar, sifted

• Put the chocolate chips, butter and water into a small saucepan. 
• Stir over lowest heat until just melted.
• Remove from heat and stir in powdered sugar.  Stir until cooled and thickened.

To assemble: Spread custard filling on top of one layer and top with second layer.  Spread chocolate icing on top of second layer.  Chill cake for at least half an hour before serving.

Adapted from "Custard Cream Filling," All About Home Baking (New York: General Foods Corporation, 1933), 74 and "Thin Chocolate Icing," Betty Crocker's New Dinner For Two Cookbook (New York: Golden Press, 1964), 68.

Creole Cake recipe here.  It's the same cake baked in a square pan and topped with chocolate/coffee frosting.

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Some music to go with the recipes (1933 for All About Home Baking and 1964 for Betty Crocker's New Dinner for Two):

1933: Guy Lombardo and His Royal Canadians featuring Bing Crosby- "You're Getting to Be a Habit with Me"

1964: Dean Martin- "Everybody Loves Somebody" (Yes, in a year full of Beatles singles I picked a Dean Martin song, but none of you dear readers are surprised.)

Another Use for "Wonder Dough"

Stollen goes really well with coffee

May I suggest baking Stollen for your Christmas celebrations?  Or, really, any time of year?  Stollen is a traditional German Christmas bread that always shows up this time of year at the imported foods store.  However, I think it's better to bake your own, even if it's a bastardized 1950s Betty Crocker interpretation of stollen.  Let's say it's stollen-inspired or something like that.  I also have to admit to changing the Betty Crocker recipe because no one in this house is a fan of glacé cherries.  Also, turns out I inadvertently skipped the kneading the fruit into the dough bit, so it's just a filling.  Feel free to knead if you try this at home.  Anyhow, my stollen is really tasty and that's all you need to know.

Super-messy counter after glazing

Download a PDF of this recipe here.

Stollen

Bread:
1/2 Sweet Dough recipe
1/2 cup blanched almonds, finely chopped
1/4 cup candied lemon peel, finely chopped
1/4 cup raisins
1 cup golden raisins
2 teaspoons butter, melted

Glaze:
1 cup powdered sugar, sifted
1/2 teaspoon lemon juice
1 to 2 tablespoons cream

After second rising, flatten dough on a lightly floured surface and top with the almonds, peel and raisins. Knead into the dough and then press dough into an oval (approx. 8" x 12").

Fold the oval in half lengthwise ("hot dog") in order to form a crescent.  Press the edges together and transfer to a lightly greased baking sheet.

Let stollen rise at room temperature 35 to 45 minutes, or until doubled or let it rise overnight in the fridge and take it out while the oven is coming up to temperature.

Brush butter over the top of the stollen and bake at 375 degrees for around 30 minutes, or until golden.  Place on a cooling rack and make the glaze.

Put the powdered sugar in a small mixing bowl and stir in the lemon juice and enough of the cream to make a glaze.  Be sure to add cream slowly, because you don't want your glaze to be too runny!  Spread glaze over top of stollen (you don't need to wait for stollen to cool).  Enjoy!

Adapted from "Stollen," Betty Crocker's Picture Cook Book (Minneapolis: Macmillan USA and General Mills, Inc., 1950), 102 and "Confectioner's Sugar Icing," Ibid, 111.

P.S. My "Missus C" mug is available from Anthropologie.

Poldark and Pasties: Cinematic and Culinary Cornwall

Today, it finally feels as though the weather has changed--the air is cool, the lawn is covered in orange leaves and it's fifteen 'til five and gray and dreary and wonderful. I'm absolutely delighted. The best things happen in autumn and winter.

One of those things is curling up and watching a BBC miniseries, like Poldark.  Made in 1975, Poldark is the story of a man (Ross Poldark) who returns from fighting in the American Revolution to discover that his estate in Cornwall has gone to rack and ruin.  I couldn't wait for each disc to arrive and I usually watched all the episodes on a single disc the day it arrived from Netflix.  Yes, it's soapy and it was obviously taped rather than filmed, but Poldark is an entertaining and enjoyable 821 minutes (and it moves a lot faster than The Pallisers).  Note: this is only a review of series 1.  Series 2 comes out on DVD next Tuesday, so I haven't seen it yet!




While you're devoting almost 14 hours of your life to Poldark, you might get hungry.  How about a Cornish pasty?

Download a PDF of this recipe here.

Pasties

Makes 8

Shortcrust Pastry x 1.5 (go ahead and make a double batch...stay tuned) (recipe here or download here)

1 lb steak (a cheap cut), trimmed of fat and cut into small pieces (1/2"x1/2")

1/2 lb potatoes, peeled and cut into 1/2" cubes

1/4 lb rutabaga or turnip, peeled and cut into smaller-than-1/2" cubes

1 medium onion, diced

mixture of dried thyme, marjoram, savoury and rosemary (or use Herbes de Provence)

salt and pepper

Divide the pastry into 8 individual discs and refrigerate until ready to use.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit.  In a mixing bowl, combine the steak, potatoes, rutabaga, onion, herbs and salt and pepper.  Stir to combine and set aside.

Roll out each disc of pastry to about 1/8" thickness.  Place 1/8 of steak mixture in the middle of the pastry round, bring two ends of the circle together, seal and flute the edges.  Place on a baking sheet and keep in the refrigerator until all of the pasties are prepared.  Repeat for the remaining seven pasties.  You'll need two baking sheets.

Bake pasties for 20 minutes at 425, then turn the heat down to 350 and bake another 45 minutes.  Cover the pasties with tin foil if they start to get too brown.

Adapted from Paul Richardson's Cornucopia: A Gastronomic Tour of Britain, Favourite Dorset Recipes and Tea & Sympathy.

And now, an idea for the leftover 1/2 recipe of shortcrust pastry...

Yes, you most certainly are allowed to make a one-crust pie with it.  May I suggest my Kentucky Bourbon Pecan Pie; Artichoke, Bacon and Cheddar Quiche or Blackberry-and-Apple Pie?

However, if you'd like something new, I have just made my first batch of Jam Tarts (adapted from The Gentle Art of Domesticity by Jane Brocket).

There's no recipe, just a few instructions.  Each batch of shortcrust pastry will make approximately 32 tarts, but you can use however much dough you have.  (The 1/2 batch of dough you have left over from the pasties will make 16 tarts in a standard-sized muffin tin.)

• Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.
• Roll the pastry dough out to 1/8" thickness.
• Cut out rounds of pastry with a 3 1/4" diameter circle cookie cutter.
• Place rounds in the wells of a standard muffin tin.
• Fill each tart with 1 teaspoon jam (any kind, I happened to have strawberry preserves).
• Bake 12-15 minutes, or until pastry has browned slightly.
• Cool on a wire rack.

Malt Whisky Ginger Cake

Autumn's Bounty

So, we have about half a bottle of Johnnie Walker Red Label that I bought for Burns Night earlier this year that is just gathering dust. Paul loathes any Scotch whisky (he's a "bourbon man") and I'm really not much of a drinker, even though I actually like Scotch. I am, however, a bit of a Philistine when it comes to whisky. I bought the Johnnie Walker simply because it had a royal warrant and, to be honest, I can't say that the single malts I've had were really any better. That's evidently why I have a food blog and not a liquor blog. Besides, to make up for it, I'm a total snob about plenty of other things.

Anyway, when I saw this recipe in The Guardian, I knew I had to try it at home. Mostly, I've just adapted the ingredients for the way Americans bake (Imperial units, volume rather than weight, etc.), but I did lower the oven temperature because I was using a larger pan and I reduced the amount of crystallized ginger and added some extra ground ginger. That's because when I bought the crystallized ginger I thought (silly me!) that an entire jar would be more than enough.

Malt Whisky Ginger Cake

Download a PDF of this recipe!

Yields 1 loaf cake

Serves 10

¼ cup unsalted butter

¼ cup black treacle

1/3 cup (packed) light brown sugar

2 large eggs

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

¼ cup Scotch whisky

2.6-oz. jar crystallized ginger (about 2/3 to ¾ cup)

1 ½ cups cake flour

1 ½ teaspoons baking soda

1 ½ tablespoons ground ginger

1 tablespoon mixed spice

1/3 cup powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit. Line an 8 ½” x 4 ½” x 2 ½” loaf pan with parchment paper and set aside.

In a medium saucepan over medium-low heat, melt the butter. As soon as the butter is melted, remove the saucepan from the heat and whisk in the treacle and sugar until smooth. Whisk in the eggs then the oil and whisky.

Using a rubber spatula, stir in the crystallized ginger. Next, add the flour one-half-cup at a time, stirring after each addition until combined. Stir in the baking soda, ground ginger and mixed spice.

Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan and bake for 45 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean. Cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then turn out on a wire rack to cool completely.

When the cake is totally cool, mix the powdered sugar with enough water to make an icing (it takes a lot less water than one would think) and then spread it over the top of the cake.

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For Mika and anyone else who was wondering about PDF hosting--

I just save my Word documents as PDFs (with my Mac, the option is in the print window) and then upload them to Scribd.com. Really couldn't be easier, even for tech-incompetent me.

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Paul poses with his doppelgänger, Simon the Chipmunk.

Hello, Autumn!

It's finally sweater weather and I couldn't be happier. Plus, there are wonderful things like pears and plums to be eaten.

Speaking of plums, I just had to make a Three Plum Pie. I watched both seasons of Pushing Daisies on Netflix and loved it even though every episode made me hungry! If you like food or the movie Amélie or Tim Burton movies, you'll probably like Pushing Daisies. I highly recommend it.

Exciting news! I've found a way to offer my recipes as PDF downloads! Click here for Three Plum Pie and here for Shortcrust Pastry.

Three Plum Pie

Crust:

9” Double-crust pie shell (See my Shortcrust Pastry recipe.)

Filling:

½ lb red plums

½ lb black plums

¼ lb damsons (Italian prune plums)

zest from ½ an orange

¼ cup sugar

1 tablespoon flour

¼ teaspoon cinnamon

¼ teaspoon nutmeg

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

1 tablespoon milk

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit.

For each plum, cut in half and remove the pit. Slice into approximately ¼” wedges. Place the wedges into a large mixing bowl. Grate the orange zest over the bowl and stir to combine. Next, add the sugar, flour, cinnamon, nutmeg and vanilla. Stir to combine and set aside.

Roll out the bottom crust of your pastry and fit to your pie plate. Pour in the plum filling and then roll out the top crust and fit over the filling, crimping the edges. Make six 1” slashes in the top of the crust.

Place the pie plate on a baking sheet and then brush the top of the pie with the milk. Bake for 12 minutes at 450 and then turn the temperature down to 325 and bake a further 40 minutes, or until the crust in nicely browned.

You should definitely have a slice while the pie is hot, but any leftovers can be refrigerated and eaten later.

Adapted from this recipe and this recipe.

Shortcrust Pastry

Adapted from All About Home Baking*

Yields two 9” pie shells (enough for one double-crust pie or two single-crust pies)

1 ¾ cups + 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

¼ teaspoon baking powder

½ teaspoon table salt

11 tablespoons cold butter, cut into small cubes

1/3 cup (approximately) cold water

In a large bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder and salt.

Next, rub in the butter with fingertips or a pastry blender until mixture resembles coarse breadcrumbs.

Incorporate a bit of the water at a time until the dough starts to come together. You may not need all the water.

Divide the dough into two equally sized discs. Wrap each disc in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least half an hour. If you don’t plan to use the dough within 24 hours, you can freeze it for up to a month.

After the dough has chilled, you can either roll the dough out between two pieces of plastic wrap (adjusting the wrap often enough to prevent it from tearing) or flour your counter and rolling pin and roll the dough out directly on the counter.

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In movie news, on October 12th Turner Classic Movies is broadcasting a Simon Templar (a.k.a. The Saint) marathon. George Sanders played Simon Templar five times (his films are on from 10:15 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. CST), but none of the films are available on DVD. Thought I'd give you a heads up in case you were interested. By the way, don't call me between 10:15 and 4:30.

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* General Foods Corporation, “Calumet Pie Crust,” All About Home Baking (New York: 1933), 101.

The 1925 Project: Wonder Dough

Back: Käse Kuchen, front: Streusel Coffee Cake

This is supposed to be a project for interwar recipes, but I'm going to fudge it a bit because my hot roll recipe comes from the 1950 edition of Betty Crocker's Picture Cookbook. However, there are very similar recipes in my older cookbooks. I just prefer the layout and instructions in my copy of Betty Crocker.

This recipe really is for a wonder dough. You can, naturally, make hot rolls, but you can also make coffee cakes, cinnamon rolls, doughnuts, Stollen, Hot Cross Buns and more from the exact same recipe. This week I used 1/2 of the recipe to make 2 dozen rolls, 1/4 of the recipe to make a Streusel Coffee Cake and the remaining 1/4 for a Käse Kuchen, which is like a big cheese Danish. It's as much work to make half recipes as whole recipes, so I like to get a good return on my investment.

I make my Sweet Dough in the bread machine, but I've provided instructions for those of you without one.

Sweet Dough

1/2 cup water, around 100º Fahrenheit

4 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast (2 packets)

1 1/2 cups milk, around 100º Fahrenheit

1/2 cup sugar

2 teaspoons salt

2 eggs, lightly beaten

1/2 cup butter, melted

5 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (approx.)

Bloom the yeast in the warm water for about 5 minutes, then pour into a large mixing bowl with the milk, sugar and salt. Stir to combine. Mix in the eggs and butter then add the flour, in two parts, stirring after each addition.

Turn out the dough and knead (adding flour if needed) until the dough feels like a baby's bottom (the best indicator--no kidding). Place in a greased bowl and cover until doubled (usually at least 1 1/2 hours).

After the dough has doubled, punch down the dough and let it rise, covered, until almost doubled again (about 30 to 45 minutes).

Hot Rolls

for 2 dozen

1/2 recipe Sweet Dough

approx. 1/3 cup all-purpose flour

After second rising, evenly divide the dough into 24 balls. Roll each ball in the flour to lightly coat. Fill two standard-sized, greased muffin tins with the dough and leave to rest, covered, around 20 minutes. Preheat the oven to 425º. Bake 12 to 15 minutes, or until rolls are nicely browned.

For a photo, please stay tuned for my next post, where I'll discuss two fried-chicken supper menus.

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Streusel Coffee Cake

makes 8 slices

1/4 recipe Sweet Dough

1/2 cup golden raisins (optional)

1/3 cup sugar

1/3 cup all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon cinnamon

3 tablespoons cold butter, diced

1/2 cup chopped pecans

After the second rising, mix the raisins (if using) into the dough. Press the dough into a well-greased 8" circular cake tin. Set aside.

In a small mixing bowl, stir together the sugar, flour and cinnamon. Cut in the butter as you would to make a pie crust then stir in the pecans. Sprinkle this mixture on top of the dough, cover and let rest about 25 minutes. Preheat the oven to 400º. Bake approximately 25 minutes, or until nicely browned.

Cool in the tin on a rack for about 10 minutes, then cool directly on the rack.

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Käse Kuchen

makes 8 slices

1/4 recipe Sweet Dough

1/3 cup sugar

1 tablespoon flour

1 cup farmers cheese, neufchâtel, drained cottage cheese or ricotta (or other soft, unripened cheese)

1 cup prunes, soaked in boiling water then chopped

1/4 cup chopped pecans

2 tablespoons sugar

1 teaspoon cinnamon

After the second rising, press the dough into a well-greased 8" cake tin. Set aside.

Stir together the 1/3 cup sugar, flour, farmers cheese, prunes and pecans. Make an indention in the dough (leaving a border) and spread the mixture into it. Combine the 2 tablespoons sugar and the cinnamon then sprinkle over the top. Cover and rest around 25 minutes. Preheat the oven to 400º. Bake approximately 25 minutes, or until nicely browned.

Cool in the tin on a rack for about 10 minutes, then cool directly on the rack.

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More 1925 music:

"Say Arabella (What's a Fella to Do)" by George Olsen & His Orchestra with Billy Murray

Available at The Internet Archive