The Art of Home Candy Making, with Illustrations

by Home Candy Makers

A FEW WORDS ON CAKE-BAKING

This is not a cook book; but as it is intended principally for ladies, we will include in it a few ideas we have in regard to cake baking, and also a few recipes for refreshments to be served when entertaining.

We are not advertising any particular brand of baking powder, as we use none, neither are we advertising any particular brand of flour. In place of baking powder, we use cream of tartar and soda, and as all pure baking powder is composed practically of nothing but these two ingredients mixed with rice flour, they will, when used in the following manner, give you the same results as baking powder, and also prevent your cake from falling.

Always use winter wheat flour for cake baking. One pound of pure baking powder is composed of one-half pound cream of tartar, one-fourth pound of soda, and one-fourth pound of rice flour. In all recipes that call for baking powder, use just one-half as much cream of tartar as it calls for baking powder, and one-half as much soda as you use of cream of tartar; that is, if a recipe calls for two teaspoonfuls baking powder, you simply use one teaspoonful of cream of tartar and a scant half teaspoonful soda. In measuring soda, always level your spoon off, and in cream of tartar, have it slightly rounding. Always sift your soda with the flour two or three times, and always put the cream of tartar in the eggs. If you use only yolks, when beating them beat the cream of tartar with them, but if your cake calls for the whites, then put in the cream of tartar and beat them until they are stiff. In order to tell when your whites are beaten sufficiently, lift your whipper or beater, turn it over quickly, and the whites that lift with it should stand up perfectly straight, and if they do this, your eggs are beaten sufficiently.

The heat of your oven has everything to do with successful cake baking and you must be careful and not allow it to get too hot. Your cake should first raise in the oven, before it commences to brown on the top, if you wish to make a success of it. If you follow the directions exactly as written here, you need have no fear of your cake falling, from opening the oven doors and looking at it at any time, or from jarring the oven in any manner, as you may take any of these cakes out of the oven when they are only partially done, shake them around, then put them back in the oven, and they will raise perfectly, providing your oven is not too hot, and you mix these cakes exactly as we direct you. This may seem a rather broad assertion, and shatter a great many ideas you now hold in regard to cake baking, but it will only cost you the time and trouble of making one cake to find out that this is correct. We have done this with cakes repeatedly in order to convince people it would not hurt them, and they would come out of the oven as light and as perfect as any cake ever baked.

It does not make a particle of difference which way you beat your cake, or whether you put all of the flour or milk in at once or a little at a time, as some cake makers direct you to, so long as you beat it thoroughly, which is a very essential point. Always put all of the flour and milk in at once, as it is much easier than adding a little at a time. If your cake falls a particle, or fails to come out perfect in any way, the fault beyond a doubt is with your oven, providing you have followed the directions. A gas or gasoline oven is by far the best for cake baking, as you are able to get the heat more regular with them. If you will measure and sift your sugar on a plate, then set it in the oven for just a few moments, until it gets warmed through, you will find it will cream nicer with the butter, as the heat in the sugar softens the butter.

You may take any cake recipe you have, and apply these same directions in making it, using cream of tartar and soda in the proportions directed, follow other directions carefully, and you will never experience any trouble with your cakes.

If you are much of a cake baker, this article alone is worth a great deal to you, and if you never had much success with your cakes, you will find it a very easy branch of domestic science to learn, instead of a difficult one, as some have led you to believe.